Pippa's Desire
by Rani-Girl
Summary: Jack's little sister wants to see him again. The Ice Queen decides to help her. Will Pitch have anything to do with her when she shows up? Yes, no, maybe so...
1. Prologue: Pippa's Choice

**My first Rise of the Gaurdians fanfiction. I don't own Rise of the Guardians, nor the Ice Queen (well mostly).**

...

"JACK!"

Pippa stared at the spot she had previously been standing on, where the ice had cracked. The spot in the pond that Jack had fell through. She stared at it in shock, unable to move, barely able to make a sound.

Her brother had saved her. Her brother was drowning in freezing water.

Her brother was as good as dead.

Hot tears began streaming down her face.

Still frozen to in place on the ice, Pippa turned her head upwards and screamed. Jack was going to die! He was dying! All because of the ice, because of her! She would never see her trickster brother alive again! Never! He was gone and it was all her fault! Why did she have to stand in the middle of the pond? If she hadn't stopped right there where the ice was thin, Jack would've never saved her and fallen through! He wouldn't be dying!

"Goodness, child! Why are you screaming?"

Pippa's scream turned into a sob as she turned her head to see who was there, startled. Someone was here! Maybe they could rescue Jack before it too late -

An unusually tall woman stood directly behind her. A snow white parka covered her body. Her skin looked to be almost a pale blue, her piercing light blue eyes looking almost threatening, as if everyone were a potential enemy. White strands of hair stuck out of her hood, the wind lightly whipping them against her face. Despite the oddness in her appearance, she was very pretty.

"Uh - I - Ja- He - " Pippa struggled to get the words out. The woman waited, staring down curiously at her. When it became apparent that Pippa couldn't explain, the woman looked up at the area behind the small girl.

"Oh my," she whispered. "Someone fell through." She gazed back down at Pippa. "Someone you know?"

"M-My brother!" she finally cried, falling down on her bottom. "Please, help him!"

The unusual woman made a quiet noise in her throat, as if she were thinking about it. She looked up at the sky, then back back down at Pippa after a moment. "No."

"_WHAT!_" Pippa choked. She wasn't going to help!? Why not?! Her brother was probably almost dead by now and she wouldn't help?! "W-w-why?"

The threatening look in the strange woman's eyes flickered, breifly changing to pity. "I will not save him, I cannot save him. ... But I can help you see him again."

Pippa didn't understand. What? See him again? He might be dead by now. D-did she mean his body? Did she mean...the afterlife? What was she talking about? All Pippa knew was that she did want to see Jack again, alive and alright.

"H-how?" she cried.

"If you really want to meet him again, you will have to leave the rest of your family forever," the woman warned. "Other than your brother, you will never see them again, nor anyone else you know in this life. You will have to leave them all behind, little girl, forever. Are you willing to do that for the sake of seeing him again?"

Pippa wasn't sure her brain was thinking right. Did the woman just say she would never see anyone else again? She didn't want that! But she did want Jack to be alright, she wanted him back. Was the woman saying she would really see Jack again if she left them? Did she actually mean she would _kill_ Pippa? The thought frightened her. Now very terrified, she scooted back an inch or two away from the woman.

"I see..." she said slowly. "You do not understand. I mean no harm to you, child. Simply, I want to help, but your brother I cannot. You, I can. In order to do that, though, you need to leave with me now. I rarely show another this sort of kindness. If you refuse, I will not offer my services again. You will mourn the loss of your brother with your loved ones and never see his face again." She stared down at her, the threatening look back. "Do you understand, child?"

She wasn't going to kill Pippa. The little girl didn't relax at all, yet she calmed down slightly. She wanted Jack back. She had to see him again. It was her fault this all happened - Maybe her brain wasn't thinking right. Hesitantly, she nodded. "I - I want to - to see him again. Please."

The woman nodded back. A ghost of a smile appeared on her face. "Then let us leave." She offered a hand to the small girl.

Pippa hesitated a moment, not sure she really wanted to do this. No, she knew she did. She took the woman's hand. "Who are you?" she asked as she was pulled to her feet.

The woman actually did smile. "The Ice Queen."

**...**

A flurry of snow took them to a palace entirely made of ice. It was surrounded by a large pit. A bridge made of ice connected the castle to the snowy area on the other side of the pit. Pippa guessed this was the Ice Queen's home.

"Welcome, Pippa Hazel Frost," the Ice Queen said, still holding her hand, making Pippa wonder how she knew her name, "to your new home." Her smile had disappeared. She led Pippa across the bridge.

The little girl had many questions, including when she would see Jack again, but found herself asking instead, "Where are we?"

"We're hidden from the rest of the world. My home in invisible to all who don't look for it," she answered cryptically.

"What?" Pippa asked. "I didn't ask that."

The Ice Queen didn't respond. Pippa remained quiet as they made their way across the bridge and entered the palace.

**...**

Pippa wasn't aware of how long she was in the Ice Palace (as she decided to call it). It could have been hours, minutes, or years. It could have been seconds. She knew that days went by, not that it felt like days at all. It was as if time wasn't normal here. She knew she hadn't gotton any older during her time in the Ice Palace, so surely it couldn't have been a year yet.

The Ice Queen gave her her own room. The room alone was bigger than her house in Burgess. Like the rest of the castle, it was all made of ice. Yet the blankets were on the bed were warm and as fexible as a real blanket. Her pillow was soft and comfortable. The toys and books felt nothing like real toys and books, but they didn't break or rip when she dropped them or turned a page. They really were ice.

The only thing that really bothered her about it all was that ice was what killed Jack. And everything here was ice.

She cried over her brother, her family, and friends the first several days (or was it weeks? Months?). Eventually it seemed that she ran out of tears, though her misery over losing them never went away completely.

The Ice Queen, who she learned at one point's real name was Silvia Icing, was away a lot of the time. When she did see her, she would question her about when she would see Jack again. Every time Pippa was told to be patient, Pippa wondered if she would never see him again, if the Ice Queen had really tricked her and trapped her here.

They would sometimes talk about Pippa's old life, her friends, her parents, Jack - The Ice Queen seemed especially interested in hearing about Jack. She spoke little of herself most of the time, but did explain what exactly she was and that there were others. She even hinted that Jack was connected to these other beings. That made Pippa all the more eager to listen to what the Ice Queen had to say about them.

"I was resurrected by the Man on the Moom," she explained softly. "He made me the Ice Queen. I bring winter wherever I go - not nessecarily snow or ice."

"Who were you before?" Pippa asked.

"Some things are better left unexplained, child," she replied. "All of your fairty tale myths - Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy, the Sandman, even the Boogeyman - they and many more are all real. Although, they may be a little different than you imagine."

"Can I meet them?"

"Maybe someday. But your brother comes first."

"When will I get to see him?"

"Be patient, child."

Pippa realized at one point that her hair was getting paler. Dark brown, light brown, dirty blonde, pale blonde, almost white blonde, and finally white.

"It's because you're lifespan would be over by now," the Ice Queen had explained, "You are no longer mortal but you are not one of us. Don't worry, your hair will be all that changes. I don't believe your eyes will turn blue." Pippa didn't understand what that meant, but it was true, nothing else changed about her.

One day, when Pippa was growing weary of being locked in the Ice Palace alone, only with the Ice Queen only some of the time, and never seeing Jack, her patron came up to her.

"Your wait will soon be over," she assured her. "Just be a little more patient. You will see him again not long from now."

Pippa was so happy! She would see Jack again, she really would! Pippa couldn't wait to run up to him and hug him, tell him how happy she was that he was okay, and all about the Ice Queen helping her. She even forgot to ask how long soon was, she was so glad!

More unusual time passed. Impatience and anticipation was eating away at Pippa. She wanted to see her brother now! How much longer did she have to wait already?!

Finally, one morning (or was it evening?) Pippa was awoken by her patron in her room.

"Get up," she ordered in a soft tone, "It is time for you to meet your brother again. He is no longer Jackson Overland Frost, but he is as you remember him, Jack Frost."

Pippa didn't even care what that meant. She was going to finally see her older brother again!

...

**Alright, first of all, I have no idea what Jack's sister's name is. I've seen at least three other people name her Pippa, so I decided to go with that. I like the name Hazel, so I made it her middle. Fits with the brown theme her family seems to have (both she and Jack had brown hair and eyes, their mother had brown hair).**

**Second, I wrote 'Despite the oddness in her appearance, she was very pretty.' instead of 'Despite the oddness in her appearance, she was very beautiful' because to me, Jack's sister looks seven to ten years old. I don't think a little girl around that age would call a grown woman beautiful instead of pretty. I just felt the need to clarify that.**

**Lastly, I do have a plan for this story, but unless I get enough ecouragement, I'll just leave it as a one-shot. (Unless I decide to anyway. But I warn you, I procrastinate.) If I do continue it, I'll explain why Pippa could see the Ice Queen. She's obviously not a guardian who children everywhere believe in or a vilian children everywhere fear.**


	2. Family Reunion

**It's a Rise of the Gaurdians fanfiction. I don't own Rise of the Guardians at all. Nor the Ice Queen (well mostly).**

**Thank you guys so much for all the alerts/favorites/follows in one day! I actually finished the second chapter this evening, so here ya go! I have responses to reviews at the bottom of the chapter. That way I can respond to all of them and you don't have to skip them at the beginning. Also, since I have school, I'm hoping to get at least one (hopefully more) chapter up every weekend. Who knows, maybe I'll have the third up tomorrow. Maybe.**

**...**

It had a few weeks since Jack had officially become a gaurdian. He'd given his baby teeth back to Tooth (after going through the rest of his memories, of course), taken his own personal tour of North's workshop (only to be thrown out by the yetis - again), snuck into the Warren and froze Bunnymund's carrots (hey, just because they had resolved their differences didn't mean their fun rivalry had to end) and given quite a few towns' children snow days, not to mention started more snowball fights.

Pitch was gone, trapped in his lair until someone feared him again. When that time came, he and the other gaurdians would there to put him back in his place. Until then, the gaurdians went back to their jobs. North as Santa, Bunnymund painting eggs, Tooth collecting teeth with her mini fairies, and Sandy putting children to sleep with good dreams.

Jack was back to having fun at all times. Though he was still invisable to most children, more and more younger children were starting to believe in him thanks to Jaime and his friends.

There was just one thing that bothered him, though. Something from when he got his memories back. Whatever happened to his family? He knew they were dead by now. It was what happened to them between his death and their's he wanted to know. His parents must have been devastated when they learned he'd died. His sister, she must have been traumatized after watching him drown. He could imagine their lives immediately after his death. It almost made him feel guilty about taking his sister to the pond that day.

Almost.

If he hadn't, he would've never become Jack Frost, gaurdian of fun, who had sworn to protect children everywhere.

He just hoped his family was okay after the whole incident.

After he had been resurrected he'd gone into his hometown, Burgess, where he found out no one could see him. He had always remembered that. He'd seen many winters go by since that night, seen millions of children, created so many snow days, and started more snowball fights than he could count. He hadn't know at the time he had a sister, or parents, or anyone who cared about him at the time. So why would they stand out in his memory? He could have played with his sister, or her kids, or grandkids, and never realized it. She wouldn't have either. He could've seen his parents and not have a clue who they were, didn't care who they were, just like many other adults.

In other words, he was clueless to how their lives turned out.

Oh well. That was all in the past. He remembered his past. His old family wasn't coming back, but it was fine because he had one to begin with and knew who they were now. Everything was alright. He still wondered, but it wasn't that important.

Now, to fly to northern Canada before Bunnymund found his frozen carrots -

Jack tensed. Something wasn't right. It felt as if something were out of place. But what?

"Jack!"

The guardian looked around. Was that his sister's voice? Why was he hearing her voice again? Had his baby teeth -

He was suddenly tackled from behind, resulting in him falling over, face flat in the snow.

"Jack!" his sister's voice rang again, this time from against his back. "I thought you were dead! I've missed you so much! I'm sorry about the ice! I - "

Jack used his arms to lift his upper body up. Shaking the snow out of his face, he turned his head to look at the person clutching his waist. Aside from the hair color (which was white), she looked exactly like his sister. She was even wearing the same clothes his sister wore that day on the pond. He knew it couldn't _be_ his sister - Pippa was long dead. So was this? And why was she crying on his hoodie? The tears were freezing in place. If she didn't knock it off or pull away soon, she would be frozen to his back.

"Hey, you're going to get my hoodie frozen to your face if you don't stop that," he said, trying to sit up and pull her off of him.

The girl just clung to him, sobbing into his back and babbling who knows what.

Jack sighed irratably. He didn't know who this kid was, or even if she was mortal or immortal. Either way, he didn't want her frozen to him.

"Hey, kid," he tried again. "Unless you like the idea of having clothes stuck to your face, you might wanna move away from me."

The little girl just buried her face deeper into his hoodie.

Shaking his head, Jack conjured up a single snowflake, flicking it towards her. Theses snowflakes were for bringing out the person's desire to have fun, not stop bawling, but it would have to do. It landed in her hair and melted. The girl's crying took a moment to cease. She pulled her face away, arms still wrapped him, and smiled brightly.

"Come on, Jack! Let's go play like we used to!" she exclaimed.

"Love to," he replied. "But first, who are you?"

The smile melted from her face. (AHH! He didn't want to make her upset again!) "You - you don't remember me?"

"White haired girl who otherwise looks like the sister I just remembered a few weeks ago? Nope, never met you before in my life," he responded before he could think of a real answer. Why did he do that?

She stared at him blankly, then scowled. "You're tricking me! Playing another joke on me! I_ am _your sister! Pippa! - Wait, remembered a few weeks ago? That's mean, Jackson!"

_Jackson_? When was the last time someone called him that? Definately when he was alive three hundred years ago. He had to admit, this girl certainly knew how to act like his sister. But where did she hear _Jackson_?

"How'd you know my name is Jackson?" he asked, weary of her.

She glared up at him. "Because I'm your sister, you big dummie! Jackson Overland Frost! You're my brother!" The glare melted away, her bottom lip started trembling, and tears started to fill her eyes again. Oh no.

"Okay, okay, okay!" Jack quickly said, putting his hands up in defeat. "Please don't cry. Look, you can't be my sister. Pippa's been dead for a very long time. You're not dead. I don't know how you know my full name - "

"Jaaaack!" she moaned sadly. "I know 'cause I'm Pippa! After you drowned the Ice Queen took me to live with her! She said she would help me see you again and she did! She also said you would be different, too." The little girl reached up and touched his hair. "I guess she meant your hair, eyes, and shirt changed. Why are you wearing that, anyway?"

Jack just stared down at her, contemplating what she just said. Ice Queen? Who in the world was that? She took Pippa away from Burgess the day he died? Could this really be her? If so, why would this queen do that?

"Oi! Frostbite!" a familiar male voice called out. "What 'id you do to my carrot garden?!"

Jack looked up to see Bunnymund stalking towards them, holding three carrots encased in pefectly squared ice up to the green leaves. He burst out laughing at the sight. The supposed Pippa (he would decide if she really was her when he learned more about the Ice Queen) turned her head to see what was so funny.

The bunny stopped about three feet away from them, gawking suspiciously at the supposed Pippa. "'Oo's this?"

"Wow!" she exclaimed, pulling away from Jack without letting him go. "The Easter Bunny!"

Bunnymund looked between Jack and the little girl, and groaned. "Please don't tell me she's your sister, mate."

"See!" she yelled in Jack's face. "Even he knows we're brother and sister!"

Great, now his (supposed) sister was taking the kangaroo's side.

"What makes you say that?" he asked him.

"You both look alike - except for the eye color," Bunnymund explained.

"He used to have brown eyes," the kid explained. "And we both had brown hair before!"

"Did'ja now? Tell me, are you as annoying as 'im, too?"

"Annoying?" the supposed Pippa repeated, obviously confused, "Jack's not annoying; he's funny."

Bunnymund's nose twitched. "I'll take that as yes, then." Turning his attention back to Jack, he snapped, "When did your sister become immortal? I thought you were all by yourself for three hundred years an' didn't know you ever had a family?"

"What? So it wasn't a joke?" She looked up at Jack with big, dejected eyes.

"Uh..." For once, he didn't know if he should lie or not. Jack chose to answer Bunnymund instead. "I was and didn't. I'm not even sure she_ is _my sister. She's supposed to be dead."

"I'm not! The Ice Queen took me in - "

"Ice Queen?!" the bunny exclaimed, eye twitching. "Did she just say the Ice Queen?"

"Yeah," the little girl looked back at Bunnymund curiously.

"Who's the Ice Queen?" Jack asked.

"A nice lady who was brought back by the moon!" the girl told him. cheerfully

"A witch who was banished away," Bunnymund said at the same time.

"No!" the supposed Pippa shouted angerly at the bunny. "She's nice and not a witch!"

"'Ow long were you with 'er, kid?" the Easter Bunny asked, leaning towards her.

"I don't know; a couple months?" she guessed.

"Pippa," Jack said, causing her to look back up. "You said she took you away the day I drowned, right?"

His supposed sister nodded.

"That means you were with her for three hundred years," Jack explained softly. Her face paled. Great, she probably hadn't known their parents and everyone else they knew (if she really was Pippa, which he was starting to believe) were dead. Now she would have to deal with that thought in her head. He expected waterworks any minute now.

The girl stared at him blankly for a few moments. She finally muttered, "She did say I would never see them again..."

That startled Jack. Wait - never see again - What!? "Pippa, you knew you would never see any of them again? When did you find that out?" Jack's temper began to flare.

Pippa shook slightly, obviously having not expected him to get mad. "W-when she said I could go with her. Why, Jack?"

"Did she kidnap you or did you go willingly with her?"

"She didn't kidnap me!" Pippa exclaimed.

"Why would you go off with a _stranger_ who promised you could your_ dead _brother again?! That was stupid, Pippa. For all you knew, she could've killed you! You know better than that!" Jack's brotherly instinct/protectiveness was beginning to kick in.

Tears appeared in her eyes once more. "She - she didn't! The Ice Queen is nice! Besides, h-how was I supposed to know not to - "

"Ma, Pa, and I told you a hundred times - you don't know them, you don't go off with them! Did they know you were leaving or anything?" he asked heatedly. He could imagine his parents reaction to find their son was dead _and_ their daughter had run away. It wasn't a pleasant thought.

"Of course not! But you were dead, and it was my fault!" The tears started rolling down her face again. They fell off her jawline and onto his hoodie, freezing almost instantly. "I had to see you again! I'm sorry, Jack! I - I just wanted to see you alive again!" She buried her face into his side.

Jack calmed down. He sighed, running a hand through his hair. Right, he fell through the ice right in front of her. He forgot. "Pippa..."

"As much as I hate to ruin a family reunion," Bunnymund interrupted crossly, reminding Jack he was there. (How embarressing - his rival watching make his sister cry. Today was getting better and better by the minute.) "But we need to tell the others about this."

"Why?" he asked, putting an arm around his sister, forgetting her tears could freeze her to his hoodie. "What's so bad about the Ice Queen?"

"Well, let's see. One," he counted off on his fingers, "she caused the ice ages. Two, she used to kidnap children and take them back to her castle, where she wouldn't let them go unless they did something as simple as spelling a word. Usually, she made them forget how to do that so she could keep them. And three," Bunnymund took a step closer, staring Jack in the eye intensely, "she used to work with Pitch."

**...**

_**Soul-Whisperer**_**: Thank you! :)**

_**AgentBugs**_**: Me too, on Friday. I'm hoping I finish this one now that I've decided to continue it. I like the idea of Jamie being her descendant, too, but that's not possible for this story. But I get what you mean.**

_**DaughteroftheRedKing**_**: Thank you! :D**

_**akito**_**: Thanks, and I'm glad it did. I hope this chapter is to your liking. (:**

_**The Goddess of Darkness**_**: Just did. :P :)**


	3. New Beginning

**I don't think I need to state the fact that I don't own the Rise of the Guardians again, do I? Anyway, I took the Ice Queen's backstory from an old storybook I have called, 'The Snow Queen'. So she's not entirely mine either.**

...

Down in the lair of Pitch Black, black sand began to stir around the weakened boogeyman.

"So soon?" Pitch asked aloud to no one in particular. "Someone is scared of me after only three weeks?" He grinned wickedly. "That's wonderful!"

If no one in the entire world was scared of the boogeyman, Pitch would be trapped in his lair until at least one child believed in and/or became scared of him. Once that happened, even if it was only one, he could leave. However, despite that, he was too weak to cause any real damage. Unfortunately, it would take a long time before he would be powerful enough to take on the guardians again. Maybe he could cause a few nightmares here and there, maybe a make few children come to believe in and fear him within the next who-knows-how-long. That was it. At least it better than being locked away longer.

Pitch walked up to his globe to see who exactly feared him and where.

"Oh, not one, but two," he said to himself. How fantastic! The two golden circles that represented the children - wait, these were not ordinary golden circles. Pitch took a closer look. One was slightly smaller than the rest, the other blinking. "How odd." Both the circles were located in northeastern Pennslyvania, right next to each other.

Siblings, perhaps? Two children who lived together? Neighbors? They couldn't be ordinary children if their representations were this abnormal.

Hold on! The lights just disappeared! No! Oh, nevermind. They had just gone to the north pole, where it was highly unlikely any child lived. Pitch laughed. One of the circles must be a guardian! Which guardian could it be, though? Well, out of all of them, who was the closest to being a child? That's right, Jack Frost! So who was the other child? It couldn't be an ordinary one. Maybe it wasn't a child at all? An adult who was scared of him that went to the north pole with Frost? That seemed even more unlikely than children living that far north.

"Well, let's go find out who this is," Pitch muttered to himself happily. He disappeared into a flurry of black sand.

**...**

"Monsters!" Pippa screamed at the sight of the yetis.

"They're yetis, not monsters, Pippa," Jack chuckled. "They work for Santa. Hey, Phil," he greeted one.

The yeti Jack called 'Phil' glared at the siblings before walking the opposite direction. Pippa tightened her grip on her brother's hand. "Elves work for Santa, not yetis," she corrected him.

"That's just what North wants them to think," the bunny explained as they walked down the hall, gesturing to the clumsy elves running around.

"Why?" she asked.

_CRASH!_

The three looked behind them. A mountain of toy robots had was falling over down the hall, much to one yeti's frustration. Two elves were having a slapping fight on top of it.

"That's why," the bunny answered with a deadpan expression.

They continued walking.

Pippa wondered why Jack hadn't been happy to see her. He was acting happy now but he hadn't earlier. He didn't even know who she was! He scolded her for going off with the Ice Queen (who was NOT a witch!) and made her cry! She had been so happy to see him and he wasn't at all. (And they hadn't payed yet!)

Maybe he changed more than just his looks.

She had been so lonely for the apparent three hundred years with her patron. Was it really that bad of her to have wanted to see him again? He tried to wave it off before they went down the rabbit hole but she still felt hurt. The Easter Bunny turned out to be mean, too. And grumpy. And called the Ice Queen a witch who used to work with Pitch.

She knew Pitch was the boogeyman. Her patron told her about him. Pippa already didn't like him and she could tell from the Ice Queen's tone wheenever she talked about him that she didn't like him either. So she couldn't have ever worked with him. It had been a while since she told Pippa about him but the little girl remembered that he used to be some sort of solider. Pippa didn't like soliders much either.

Pippa remembered when she was really little she used to be scared of the boogeyman. She used to climb in her parents' bed whenever she got scared he was hiding somewhere. They always told her he wasn't real, there was nothing to be scared of, and eventually started sending her back to her own bed. That was when she started climbing into her brother's bed. Sometimes Jack would wake up and tell her ridiculous stories about the boogeyman to make her laugh.

"Do you know they call him the boogeyman?" he asked her once, yawning.

"No," she had answered. "Why?"

"Because he's made out of boogers!" he exclaimed in a whisper, as to not wake their parents.

"Ew! That's gross, Jack!" she laughed.

"Exactly. He hates being made out of snot so much he tries to scare kids at night. Too bad for him that we know he's just a giant booger, so there's nothing to be scared of. - Unless you're scared of boogers. Are you?"

"No!"

She must have been five years old when she stopped leaving her bed at night to hide with Jack. Shortly after she just stopped believing in the boogeyman entirely. When the Ice Queen told her he was real, he _really _was real, she became scared again. The Ice Queen assured her he couldn't get her in her palace, though. Now that she was out of the Ice Palace, she was sort of scared again.

Pippa looked around Santa's workshop in wonder as Jack explained what the guardians were. She didn't bother telling him she already knew from her patron.

"North - who's Santa - is the guardian of wonder," he went on. "Tooth - she's the tooth fairy - she's collects baby teeth that have our memories in them. When we need to remember the good times, she gives us those memories back. Sandy is the sandman. He gives you good dreams. And the the Easter Kangaroo, here - "

"Bunny, you little bugger!"

" - paints walking eggs all day long." Jack smiled cheekily when the Easter Bunny glared at him. "And I'm the guardian of fun," he finished.

Now that was something the Ice Queen hadn't told her. "Really? You're a guardian? That's so cool!"

Jack grinned. "Yup. I make all the snow days, I start fun snowball fights, and - "

"Starts blizzards," the Easter Bunny muttered, grumpy again.

"Wow," Pippa said in amazement.

"Yeah, I'm amazing," Jack said smugly.

"Don't forget annoying," the bunny added.

Her brother looked like he was about to retort when a BIG man in red walked up to them. He had tattos on his arms that said 'Naughty' and 'Nice' surrounded by other tattoos. He was kind of scary looking.

"Bunnymund! Jack! Little girl!" he greeted cheerfully in a Russian accent. "What brings - little girl!" He gaped at her. "Why is little girl here?"

"She's my sister," Jack stated.

"Probably," the Easter Bunny said.

"I am!" Pippa yelled. Why would he suddenly accuse her of that _now?_ She thought they were passed that.

"Maybe," he replied suspiciously.

"Sister? When did you get a sister, Jack?" the big man asked her brother.

"Oh, about three hundred and some years ago," he answered sarcastically.

"You never told us!"

"I didn't know until we beat Pitch I ever had a family, North. You know that. Besides, I didn't know she was alive until today."

"She more than likely isn't," the bunny commented.

"Why do you keep saying that?" Pippa asked indignantly.

"Yeah," Jack agreed. "How do you know she's not?"

He ignored them. "North, this girl says she's been with the Ice Queen for the past three hundred years."

North's face dropped. "Ice Queen? I'll call Tooth and Sandy here."

Jack sighed impatiently. "Are you going to tell us who that is or what? I remember the part about the ice ages, kidnapping, and working with Pitch, but it's not like you explained it."

The Easter Bunny looked at him. "The Ice Queen used to be called the Snow Queen. She was the spirit of winter a long time ago. Just like you, she could control snow, ice, frost, ect." he began. "The witch not only had the habit of starting terrible snow storms, most worse than yours, Jack, she loved taking children away to her palace. She cursed the children so they would have to spend forever with her unless they could complete a simple task, like spelling a word. Sounds easy enough, right? Except she made it so they forgot how to do it. We always had to hunt for her Palace and free the kids ourselves.

"In the dark ages," he continued, "the witch changed her title to the Ice Queen when she started working with Pitch. They agreed to work together to take over the world using fear and cold."

Pippa saw her brother's face harden. She winced. He believed him. She wanted to tell him it wasn't true but the bunny continued.

"Once we stopped them Pitch was trapped in his lair and the witch was banished. I think she lost her control over snow and ice, too. Haven't seen or heard from her since. Trust me, mate, by herself she wasn't one you wanted to mess with, let alone with Pitch."

"What about Pippa not being Pippa?" Jack asked.

"For all we know, this little girl could just be an illusion or something. Meant to get rid of you so the Ice Queen can control ice and snow again," the Easter Bunny guessed.

"You're wrong!" Pippa shouted at him. "I really AM Pippa!" Her vision started to blur. Great, she was crying again. That made three or four times today. Wretching her hand from her brother's, she ran away from the two. Who wanted to be around people who thought she wasn't real? She WAS real! Why didn't they believe her? Even her own brother thought she was actually dead.

"Pippa!" Jack shouted after her.

She didn't stop. She kept running until she found a giant, wooden double door. Pushing through, Pippa found it was an office. She climbed onto the window sill in the backof the room and tucked her head between her knees. She thought about what the Ice Queen told her before she led Pippa to Jack.

"Remember what I said," her patron told her. "He's not the Jackson you remember. He's still your brother but he's changed in some ways."

"Aren't you coming with me?" she asked in confusion.

The Ice Queen shook her head. "I don't think that's a good idea," she said softly. "I'm not that well liked among his allies."

"Why?"

"That's not your business, child. You're brother is off that way. Go on, go meet him."

"Am I going to see you again?" she asked worridly. She didn't want her patron to leave her!

The Ice Queen smiled a small smile. "If you want to, just come looking for my palace." She reached her hand into her parka and pulled out a box. "Keep this hidden. If you want to come back, just open it and start searching."

The she was gone, disappeared in a flurry of snow.

Pippa took the small, white, velvet box out of her coat. Maybe she should open it...

The doors burst open. She quickly put the box back in her coat before the person could see it. They might take it away if they knew about it.

"Pippa!" Jack exclaimed. "Why did you run off like that?"

"Because that kangaroo was telling lies and you don't want me here!" Pippa said, her voice full of venom.

Jack cracked a smile when she said kangaroo, which turned into a frown by the time she finished her sentence. "Don't want you here? That's not true!"

"Yes it is! You weren't nice to me earlier AND you believe what the kangaroo said!" she accused him. "You think I'm dead when I'm not! That I'll just hurt you for the Ice Queen just 'cause he said so!"

"No I don't." He walked up to the sill and sat in front of her, their feet almost touching. "Bunny and I have clashed horns more than getting along. Besides, you know too much about me and how to act like my sister to not be her." He smiled at her.

Pippa glared at him. She hadn't said that much about him himself and he knew it. She chose to ignore it. "You looked like you believed him."

He shrugged. "I don't anything about any Ice Queen. How would I know what's true and what's not? Plus, Pitch offered me to work with him to take over the world, too."

"So the Easter Bunny took that and lied," Pippa said.

"No, he didn't," Jack argued. "He wasn't there."

"It's not true, though," she went on. "I never saw any other kids while I was with her. She wasn't around much either but when she was she was nothing but kind to me."

"Then I believe you," Jack said. "If she was nice to you she was nice to you. I'm sorry about earlier. I just thought you lived your life in Burgess and..." He trailed off.

They sat in an awkward silence for a minute.

"You still have the stick you saved me with," she commented, pointing to the hooked stick in his hand.

He looked down at it. "Yeah. I use it to make frost."

Pippa crawled over into his lap and hugged him. Her brother hugged her back.

"AWW!"

They both jumped. A woman covered in different colored feathers was floating in front of the doors, a little humming bird with the same colors flapping it's wings rapidly next to her.

"Tooth!" Jack shouted.

Pippa screamed at the sight of the bird-woman.

**...**

In the shadows of North's office, Pitch grinned wickedly. So it was Frost's sister who feared him. Not only did she fear him, she had been with his old co-worker, the Ice Queen for three hundred years. And Jack, he was scared of losing his sister, especially to him! He would have laughed if they couldn't hear him.

Oh, this was going to be fun.

...

_**The White Grim**_**: Wow, glad it caught by surprise, I guess, haha.**

_**The Goddess of Darkness**_**: Sorry, I hate cliff hangers too, but they make the story more suspenseful.**

_**storygirl99210**_**: Yeah, she didn't. But strange looking or not, it is dangerous to go off with someone who says they'll let you see a dead loved alive again.**

_**BlackRose556**_**: According to the wiki, Jack's real name was Jackson Overland Frost before he died. Plus, Frost is a real last name. So I went with it. It fits in my opinion. If you know for sure it's not Frost and what it really is (please cite your source, though), tell me and I'll happily change it to the right name. I'm happy you like the story. :D**

_**AgentBugs**_**: Thank you! (:**

_**GusCGC**_**: Thanks, here ya go. :)**


	4. The Start

**This is a Rise of the Guardians fanfiction. FANFICTION. I do not own. I don't really own the Ice Queen either. Or at least bits of her character. I'm hoping to get at least one more chapter out before Monday. However, if I do, it'll be tomorrow. I'm not going to be online again until tomorrow afternoon.**

**I almost had writer's block for this chapter. **_**AgentBugs**_**'s review gave me a few ideas. Everyone thank him/her! (Unless you don't want to. Still.) The ideas were Pippa's teeth and flying (which wil be next chapter). Besides that, you guys are awsome! The amount of reviews, favorites, and alerts are amazing for one week, three chapters, and just over 7,000 words (as of ch. three)! Thanks a lot!**

...

Jack clamped a hand over his sister's mouth. She really had to stop doing that.

"That's not a monster, it's the tooth fairy," he told her. Pippa nodded slowly, eyes still wide. He pulled his hand away from her mouth. "Tooth, this is - "

"Pippa, your sister. I know. North told me," Tooth interrupted. She and Babytooth zipped to window in the back of the room. Babytooth flew right above Jack's shoulder as Tooth pried Pippa's mouth open to examine her teeth, much like she did to him a few weeks ago.

"Gah!" the younger girl cried in surprise.

"Not as white but in good condition. You should floss more," she told Pippa cheerfully. The little girl bit down on her fingers. "Ow!" Tooth snatched her hands away.

Jack smiled tightly, trying to stifle his laughter. It was at that moment Tooth decided to pry his mouth open for inspection again.

"Still as white as snow as last time! So perfect," she sighed happily.

"Stop that," Jack tried to say. It came out as, "Hop ath."

Pippa stared at the tooth fairy strangely. "You're weird." Tooth didn't seem to hear her. If she did, she ignored it.

Jack grabbed her wrists, yanking her hands out of his mouth. "Anyway..."

Tooth zoomed in on his sister again. Pippa leaned back toward the window to put distance between them. "She's so cute! You two look so much like each other. Have you lost the rest of your baby teeth yet, sweetie?" The question was directed at Pippa.

The little girl continued to stare the tooth fairy stangely before looking at her brother. "Is she your girlfriend?"

Startled, Tooth flew a few feet back, blushing. Jack jumped backwards, hitting his head on the window pane. "Ow! No! Where'd you get that idea?"

"She said I'm cute and we look like each other. Doesn't that mean she's calling you cute?" she asked innocently.

"No, no, no! You misunderstood!" Tooth quickly said. "I didn't mean it as one thought! I -"

"We're not together, Pippa," Jack said firmly. Babytooth angerly pecked him under his ear. He half-heartedly swatted her away.

She shrugged. "Okay, if you say so."

"We should get back to the others," he suggested, standing up. "Cut it out, Babytooth!"

The fairy glared, gave him one final peck, and flew back to Tooth's side.

Well that was embarressing! Did Pippa _have_ to ask that out_ in front _of Tooth?

**...**

When they got back to North's globe - where he, Bunnymund, and Sandy were talking (or making sand pictures) - Pippa hid behind Jack's legs, squeezed her eyes shut and stuck her tounge out. Bunnymund was the first to notice them. Having dealt with Jack for so many years, he must've been able to sense that someone (particularly a Frost) was mocking him. The bunny scowled at the little girl. Jack looked down to see what he was making that face at and grinned.

North and Sandy looked, too. The smiled, though it was obvious they were nervous.

"Ah, hello little girl," North greeted.

"Are you really Santa?" she asked.

All nervousness disappeared from North's manner at the innocent question. "Of course!"

"This is ridiculous," Bunnymund scoffed. "We ought to make sure she isn't a fake first."

"She's not fake," Jack defended her. She couldn't be. Especially if she got on the bunny's nerves while hardly trying. That _had_ to mean she was definately Jack's sister.

Pippa glared at Bunnymund. "I'm not!" she repeated to him.

Another one of Tooth's fairies flew up to Pippa. She inspected Pippa briefly before flying up to Tooth and Babytooth. The bird seemed to say something to them. Tooth nodded.

"Pippa," she started, "do you want to tour the workshop?"

"What?" North and Jack exclaimed in shock at the same time.

"Why would you offer that? The yetis are working!"

"No fair! Everytime I try to see the place I either get thrown out or some sort of talk!"

Tooth shot them both a look that said, 'Be quiet, both of you! I'm working.' Turning back to the younger Frost, she smiled brightly. "My fairies and the yetis can show you all the toys. I'm sure North will let you play with some of them, too."

"Those are for Christmas! Not now," North objected.

Tooth shot him another look.

Pippa locked her jaw. "Not without Jack. I know what you're doing."

They wanted to talk privately about Pippa without the kid around. Huh. What a perfect oppurtunity to finish seeing the rest of the workshop. Jack smiled mischieviously. "I'll take her," he offered.

"No," Bunnymund said firmly. "You're staying here with the rest o' us. We have to talk."

"About?" he asked without any enthusiasm, just to get on the bunny's nerves.

"About - You know what!" Bunnymund stomped his foot in frustration. Success.

"Why is this such a big deal? It's not like Pippa's with the Snow Queen or whatever she's called anymore," he said.

"That's not the problem, Jack," Tooth said. "Pippa, really, go play with the toys."

"No!" she shouted definatly. "I wanna listen to - "

"OH, for goodness _sake_!" Bunnymund complained, slapping his forehead. "Sandy, just knock 'er out already!"

"What?!" the younger Frost looked scared. Sandy threw a bit of his sand at her. The sand hit her square in the face. Pippa's eyes drooped. She wobbled a bit before falling over on her side, passed out asleep.

Jack scowled. "Was that really necessary?"

Sandy shrugged, smiling sheepishly, as if to say 'sorry'.

He glanced at his sister's peaceful, sleeping form on the floor before looking back at the other guardians. He didn't want to wake her up now. She would just throw a fit and be put out again. "Okay, so what's up?" he asked, tone irritated.

The four looked at each other, probably surprised he went along with it so easily.

"This is first time we've heard from the Ice Queen in centuries," the guardian of wonder began.

"We were startin' to think she died," Bunnymund continued.

"Even Pitch would pop up every once in a while after the dark ages," Tooth said.

An image appeared over Sandy's head, depicting a woman in a parka.

"That's her?"

Sandy nodded.

"Sooo...you guys are worried she'll start kidnapping again?" Jack guessed.

"That and she'll team up with Pitch to take over the world again," Bunnymund replied.

Tooth nodded. "And for your sake, Jack. She might try to get rid of you."

"For my power over ice and snow?" he recalled his conversation with Bunnymund earlier.

"Yes," North confirmed. "She may believe if you are out of way, she will get her full powers over winter back."

That was definately a scary thought. Jack didn't want to lose his powers. How would he have as much fun? (Aaaannd the Ice Queen might start another ice age. But that wasn't as important right now.) "Would she?"

"Who knows?" North raised his hands, palms up, shrugging. "It has never happened before. Has it?" He looked to the other guardians questionably.

"Not that I know of," the bunny responded coldly.

"I don't remember anything like that," Tooth answered.

Sandy shook his head no.

North looked back at Jack. "See?"

He made a sick face. "And...you think she's using Pippa to get to me?"

"_I _think your sister's long dead," the Easter Bunny said. "That girl right there is a fake. Nothing but a sham meant to gain your trust."

Jack shook his head. He was starting to get frustrated with that idea. It couldn't be true. Some sham wouldn't act completely like Pippa or blurt out it used to live with the Ice Queen, would it? "I really don't think that's true. Isn't there any way you could test that idea?"

"Maybe," the tooth fairy answered instead of Bunnymund. "If she can open her cylinder of baby teeth. Altough, a convincing double might be able to, too..." She sounded unconvinced of the suggestion herself.

"Why do you want to believe she's your sister so much, anyway?" his furry rival asked him suddenly, eyeing him curiously. "I know she _might_ be, emphasize on 'might', yet she probably isn't and you know it. Why're you defending her so much?"

The Easter Kangaroo did have a point. The chances that this Pippa was fake were higher than the chances she was real. She even had white hair instead of brown. Pippa was no winter spirit and this was a young child, not an old woman. So why was he so attatched to idea that she was his sister so fast? Because of how she acted and resembled her? Because he saw her cry two or three times already and felt bad? Or was it because he finally had a member of his family back?

The last one made the most sense. He had wanted a family for so long, he was tired of being lonely. When he finally remembered his real family he was ecstatic; yet they were all gone, dead. Even with his new guardian status and friends, he was believed in only by a handful of children, meaning most couldn't see him. Having his little sister back would be wonderful for him. He would have a family, someone who believed in him, and would always be with him. Jack would never be lonely again.

He thought he was he content with just knowing he had once had a family before. Now, he realized that he missed them more than he originally thought.

This girl had to be his sister. He needed her to be - Jack shoved that thought away. Little sisters need their older brothers, not the other way around.

Pippa stirred on the floor.

Jack glanced at her before looking back at the guardians. Not wanting to explain his reasons, he shrugged. "I just do."

Bunnymund threw his arms in the air. "That's not a good reason! If she turns out to be the Ice Queen's pawn, you're going to regret it, Frostbite! You'll - "

Jack was already sick of the lecture. He aimed his staff and shot some frost at his rival, freezing his mouth shut. Bunnymund glared at Jack so viciously, the teenager wondered if he was going to lunge at him and beat him with his boomerang. Jack held his staff in front of him defensively. Sandy seemed to decide it was time to step in between the two.

A picture of a tombstone materialized above his head.

"He's going to kill me?" Jack guessed the image meant.

Bunnymund nodded, agreeing, reaching for his boomerang. North held his arms down with one hand.

Sandy shook his head. The picture changed to an entire graveyard.

"I don't understand," North said, rubbing his chin in confusion.

"We should go to a cemetary?" Tooth tried, cocking her head.

Sandy nodded enthusiastically. He was probably happy someone understood him.

Jack raised an eyebrow. "Why?"

The sandman pointed to Pippa, who stirred again. The tombstone reappeared above his head.

North gasped, horrified. "You want to kill her?!"

Sandy seemed to groan as he slapped his forehead. Shaking his head once more, the image changed to Jack kneeling at grave that read 'Pippa'.

"Ooooh," Jack realized what he was saying. "We should see if she has a grave."

Sandy nodded, exasperated.

"Oh." North scrated his head sheepishly.

"If she has one, it would be in our hometown," Jack said.

"Unless she moved," Tooth said. "Or her something happened to her tombstone."

The frost finished melting on Bunnymund's face. "_You little, rotton, ice cold bugger -_ "

North clamped a hand over the Eatser Bunny's mouth when Pippa started to open her eyes. She yawned and sat up.

"Why was I sleeping? Is that what the yellow man's dust did?" She asked her brother.

"Pretty much," Jack answered, relaxing and leaning against his staff. "And he's the sandman. You can call him Sandy, though."

"O-kay... Why'd he put me to sleep? What were you talking about?" she demanded.

"How to prove you're real," her brother answered casually.

Pippa's face lit up. "How?" she asked eagerly.

Jack stared at Tooth. "Could we try letting her open her baby teeth container-thing?"

Tooth looked unsure. "Well...I suppose I can go get it. What about her grave?"

"My grave? I don't have a grave. Do I, Jack?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. Let's go check the graveyard in Burgess. Tooth can bring us your baby teeth there. Right, Tooth?"

"Alright..."

His sister stood up. "Why do we have to see if I have a grave to make sure I'm real? Or my baby teeth?"

"Because if you have one and it says you died when you were, I don't know, eighty..." Jack trailed off. "And only the real Pippa would be able to open it."

Pippa seemed to understand. "Okay. Then can we play together?"

Jack grinned. "Yeah! I'll even show you around, let you meet my friend Jamie, his friends, and his younger sister. Hm, I wonder if they'll be able to see you or not?"

Pippa shrugged. "Why wouldn't they?"

"It's a long story. I'll tell you later."

"Alright. How are going to get to Burgess? Down another rabbit hole?"

His grin widened. "Nope. We're gonna fly there." He stooped down. "Get on my back."

"Fly? You can fly?! Why didn't you say so before!" Pippa jumped on his back and wrapped her arms around his neck. He tucked his arms under her knees. Jack stood up straight.

"Because we took a rabbit hole here! As fun as that is, flying's better! Can one of you open the window?" he asked the others.

North let go of Bunnymund and opened a window, watching the oversized bunny suspiciously. Bunnymund scoffed.

Jack took off and jumped out the window. "Wind!" he called. The wind picked up and carried them away, Pippa shrieking in delight.

**...**

The guardians watched them leave.

"I hope she really is his sister, for Jack's sake," Tooth muttered.

"I just hope he isn't too torn up if he find that she's not," Bunnymund replied.

North sighed sadly. "What do we do if she's not? Or about Silvia?"

Sandy closed the window. He wondered if it were possible she was the real Pippa yet was willingly working with the Ice Queen. For Jack's - and all of their's - sake, he hoped not.

...

**storygirl99210: I'm trying to squeeze more brother-sister love in. It's just that I'm new to writing family fics. I don't think this chapter has much of a moment in it, but I'll try more next chapter (unless something happens in the plot).**

**Actiongirl101: Thank you! :D**

**AgentBugs: Not quite, but thank you for the suggestions! I almost had writer's block for this chapter and sort of the next. If you've seen the last time I updated my other stories, you'd know that's not a good thing for me.**

**BlackRose556: Thanks! (:**

**Allison: THANKS! PLEASE DON'T EXPLODE! Haha. :)**

**Torsamors: Thank you! I actually started writing this after I saw there weren't many involving his sister.**

**Fey Beauty: Thanks!**


	5. Here We Go Again

**I don't own Rise of the Guardians. If I did I wouldn't be on Fanfiction . net, now would I? (Bleh, why do I keep making these? One's good enough. Guess it's a habit now.)**

**Okay, I'm SO sorry about updating late. I have a million excuses, including the fact I found a canon piece of information that ruined a vital piece of my plot (I'd tell you what but I'd spoil the story). I'm still trying to figure out how to work around that. Again, sorry! :(**

...

Pippa clung to her brother for dear life. (Wait, could she die? If she fell would she really fly like Jack could? Better not try to find out.) Naturally, she was terrified of falling, yet the excitement of flying was stronger. Every kid dreams at least once of flying (unless they've been scared of it since they were born) and now she was! - Via Jack, of course. It was amazing!

Glancing down, Pippa watched the water as they zipped over the ocean. They would be in Burgess in no time!

"How do you do this?!" she shouted in Jack's ear.

"It's part of being a spirit of winter, I guess!" he told her.

Pippa frowned. Wasn't the Ice Queen the spirit of winter? Maybe there could be more than one spirit of winter. That would certainly explain it. So how come Jack never knew about her, especially since he knew people who had nothing to do with winter? Or, why all his friends seemed to dislike her so much? Had she really done those things they'd talked about? Kidnapping and working with the boogeyman? Whether they were true or not, Pippa decided, she was going to have a talk with her patron.

Jack turned his head to look at her. "You okay? You're being really quiet."

She nodded. "I'm fine. Do you really think we'll find my grave if I never died?"

He turned his head back around. Pippa could see land beneath them. The buildings were tiny and weird looking.

"Some graves are just memorials. They don't have bodies in them because the body was never recovered," he said quietly. Pippa had to strain to hear him.

"Oh. Do you have one?" she asked.

Jack didn't answer for a moment. "Never thought to look for one."

"Oh." Jack seemed really uncomfortable. She decided to drop the subject. "Who were those kids you were talking about earlier? James or something?"

"Jamie," he corrected, tone lightening. "Jamie Bennett, his sister, Sophie, and his friends. They helped us stop Pitch by believing in us and not being afraid of Pitch. Well, Sophie mostly just helped paint Easter eggs..."

"Are they nice?"

"Yeah! And about your age, give or take a year or two."

"Do you think they'll see me? Why wouldn't they, Jack?" she asked, thinking of he said earlier.

The wind brought them closer to the ground.

"Well," he began, "we have to be believed in in order to be seen. You're not really anyone people have heard about, let alone believed in. Then again, if I tell them about you they should be able to believe. On the other hand, you're not a sprite, spirit, or whatever everyone else is."

His bare feet landed lightly on the ground. He crouched down to let Pippa jump off. Her legs wobbled a bit, getting used to being on the ground again. She looked up at the iron gate in front of them. Engraved on a plack next to the gate was, 'Burgess Cemetary'. They walked through it.

Inside were huge tombstones made of rock and little rectangles in the ground. Flowers - real and fake - were placed on some of the graves and around the tombstones. Every now and them she saw a rock or a coin left on the stone markings. A few had flags planted in the ground in front of them. As they walked further into the graveyard, Pippa read the names, dates and messages. The dates went further and further back in time the farther they went. Some had messages like, 'Beloved mother', 'Will be missed', bible quotes, and strange words and abbreviations.

"Jack?"

"Yeah?"

"Wha'do all these things mean?"

"'Things'?"

Pippa pointed one of the nearby graves. "What does Vi-et-nam mean? And the flag?"

"Vee-et-nom," Jack corrected. "It's a country. At one point the U.S. was at war with them. The flag just means they served in the military at the time." He stuffed one hand in his coat-thing's pocket. "I didn't pay too much attention to the war itself. I just made it snow. Snowing _used_ to halt the fighting..." He shrugged. "C'mon, the older graves are just another mile or two down."

"What about W-W-I-I?" she asked.

"World War Two. Like I said, I didn't pay too much attention to the war itself." He seemed uncomfortable again. She decided to let that matter drop, too.

Pretty soon, the death dates dropped to the late eighteen hundreds.

Pippa was getting bored and nervous at the same time. Bored because, obviously, there was nothing to do. Nervous because what if they found her grave and it wasn't just a memorial? Or it was someone else's and they just thought it was her's? What if Jack (or the others) wanted to check other graveyards too? She didn't want to do this forever. She also didn't want to see how her brother reacted if they did find her's.

But that was impossible, right? She went with the Ice Queen, she didn't actually die. So she couldn't have a real grave.

The dates kept decreasing. It wasn't long before the words became faded or illegible. Oh, lord, what if they found her grave or memorial but the death date was smudged? It could've said the year she disappeared but looked like fifty years later!

"See any familiar names yet?" Jack asked.

"No. Wait - Over there!" Pippa pointed to a specific tombstone and ran over to it, kneeling at the grave.

Jack followed, although he just walked. Maybe he wasn't too eager to see the graves of people he once knew. He held his staff against one shoulder. "Oh, I remember her. She used to laugh at me with you. Died a few years after I drowned in a fire." He didn't sound happy in the least, but not too upset either.

Pippa wimpered. She felt tears well up in her eyes. No, she wouldn't cry again. She'd done enough of that earlier, along with the time she spent weeping at the Ice Palace. Besides, they had to find her grave, if she had one. Pippa felt her brother's hand squeeze her shoulder lightly.

"It's alright, Pippa," he said. "Let's go search around some more."

He took her hand and led her a few feet away.

"I knew everyone might be dead," she tried to explain. "It wasn't easy to tell time in the Ice Palace - the Ice Queen's palace. But I didn't think it would be _so long_ either. Everyone's gone..." she trailed off quietly.

Jack didn't answer. He just took and squeezed her hand as they walked.

They were silent for a moment.

"Found 'em," he finally said, stopping.

Pippa looked at the graves he was staring at. The middle two looked older than the outer two. The first one her eyes fell on was the one second to the far left. She could barely read the name, let alone the years.

'Jac_so_ _ Ov_land F_st'

The one on the far right.

'_nothan Frankl_ Fr_st'

The one one the far right.

'Mary Al_e Overla_-Fro_t

And the one to that one's left.

'Pip_ Haz_ _ros_'

From left to right it said, Jonathan Franklin Frost, Jackson Overland Frost, Pippa Hazel Frost, and Mary Alice Overland-Frost. Their and their parents' graves.

"So this is what the markers looked like," she heard her older brother mutter to himself.

He knelt down and squinted at his sister's grave. "Let's see... Yeah, that's the same year I died. And that word looks like 'missing', kind of. Now we just have to wait for Tooth - "

Her thoughts became jumbled and mixed up. Pippa couldn't help it; she let out a sob.

Everyone was dead. They probably thought she ran away or slipped through the ice, too. As far as their parents were concerned, Jack saved her for nothing. They probably didn't even know he died saving her. It was all her fault they disapeared from their lives. Not only them, but their friends and neighbors, too! What if they thought they both ran away? Was Jack's body ever found? They died never knowing what really happened to their children. Why did she ever agree to go with the Ice Queen? Now she knew why Jack had yelled at her earlier. Had they ever gotton over them?

Pippa barely noticed as her brother scooped her into his lap hugging her. She didn't notice the bird-lady-tooth fairy and her hummingbird land a few feet away or her brother shake his head at her, silently telling her to give them a minute. She was too busy dealing with her emotions.

After what seemed like forever of crying, Pippa struggled for a moment to detatch her frozen cheek from her brother's clothes. She struggled to catch her breath. He stroked her cheek with his his thumb, wiping away a falling tear.

"You okay?" he asked softly.

The younger Frost started to nodd, then shook her head. "Everyone's dead but us. I didn't realize I'd miss everyone so much."

"I miss them, too," he told her.

"I hate to interrupt, I really do." Pippa's head snapped to the side, finally seeing the bird-lady, Teeth, or something. "But if you don't stop now,_ I'm _going to start crying." She flew closer to them, holding a golden capsule with a drawing of Pippa's face on it in one hand.

"Those are your baby teeth," Jack explained.

"Oh." Pippa sniffed. "If I open it then everyone w-will believe I'm the real Pippa?"

The fairy looked up at her brother.

He said, "The grave has the year I died on it."

She smiled gently at the little girl. "Of course. Well, Bunny might still be suspi- I mean, yes!"

The younger girl reached out, taking the capsule. She turned it over in her hand. "How am I suppose to to open it?"

Jack started to answer as she messed around with it, "Just grab the - "

The capsule popped open, revealing two incomplete rows of small teeth. Pippa looked between her brother and the bird-woman. (Really, what was her name again? She'd have to ask Jack later. It sounded rude to ask her herself again.) They were both smiling; Jack grinning and his friend smiling widely. Even the humming bird looked happy.

"This is wonderful!" she exclaimed. "Now we have to tell the others about this!"

"Yeah. Hey, I'm going to take her to meet Jamie and his friends first, alright?" Jack told the fairy, standing up, pushing his sister gently off his lap.

The fairy woman frowned. "I don't know, Jack..."

He cocked his head to the side. "Why? We've already proved she's the real Pippa. Besides, I wanna see if anyone can see her."

"And you promised to play!" Pippa reminded him.

"And I promised to play with her. C'mon, what's the harm?"

She looked as if she wanted to say something but held it back. "Alright. But if North sends Bunny and the yetis to kidnap you again, you know why."

"They kidnapped Jack?" Pippa looked at her brother with wide eyes. "When? Why? How?"

"It was when they found out I was supposed to be a guardian. I'll explain it to you later. Jamie ought to be home from school by now. Let's go see him before he gets distracted by homework or something," he replied.

The fairy flew off. The humming bird remained where it was.

"Guess Babytooth's coming with us," he observed brightly.

"Um, Jack, not to be rude, but what was her name again?"

"Babytooth?"

"No, the one I asked if she was your girlfr- "

Jack cut her off nervously. "Oh, Tooth."

Pippa followed her brother and the humming bird. At least he didn't seem uncomfortable anymore.

**...**

Jack had said it'd been three hundred years since they disappeared, right? The town had certainly changed in the strangest way since then. Jamie turned out to live in a two story, yellow house surrounded by a wooden picket fence. Trees weren't as common in town as before. The younger Frost didn't even know what the metal objects on wheels in the roads were for.

Jack looked around the house for an open window. When he finally found one, he took Pippa's hand, flew up to the window, and followed her in. The hummingbird - Babytooth - fluttered in after him.

The room was painted pink and filled with stuffed, animals, toys, and children's picture books scattered everywhere. The bed was small and low to the ground. A little girl with unkempt blonde hair, long enough to cover her right eye, was sitting on top of a teddy bear, playing with a tiny, stuffed, grey bunny with large green eyes.

Jack suddenly burst out laughing.

Pippa stared at him oddly. "What's so funny?"

Before he could answer, the little girl looked up, mouth in the shape of an O, which turned into a bright smile. "JACKIE!" She jumped up, ran over to them, and launched herself into Jack's arms. The little girl shoved her toy in his face. "Bunny! Hop, hop, hop! Hop, hop, hop, hop, HOP!" She hit him in his face and on his neck with the toy, trying to show him it could hop.

"Yeah, I know, Sophie. Hop, hop," he laughed.

"Bunny painted eggs!" she pointed to the bottom of a dresser in the far corner of the room. Three eggs, one cracked and one broken, were messily covered in finger paints, which was also smeared on the bottom of the dresser and floor. "He not as good as bigger bunny."

Jack grinned wickedly. "Oh no, I think they turned out a lot like his eggs."

Sophie beamed, hugging the stuffed animal tightly to her chest.

"Jack," Pippa tried to catch his attention.

Sophie twisted around in his arms to see who spoke, causing Jack to almost drop her. "Who's that?

"That's my sister. Hey, do you know where your brother is?"

Sophie just gawked at Pippa. "Sister? Like me and Jamie?"

"Uh, yeah. Do you know where he is?" Jack asked again.

"Sophie!" Mrs. Bennett suddenly called from downstairs. "I just baked cookies! Come get one!"

"COOKIES!" The toddler squirmed out of Jack's arms, landing on her butt. She quickly got up and scurried out the door.

"Well that didn't help at all," Jack smiled, leaning on his staff. "Other than she could see you."

"After I said something," Pippa added. She had no idea what talking had to with seeing, but the toddler hadn't seemed to notice her before. Maybe it was just her excitment over seeing Jack. That was understandable. "She's cute. How old is she?"

"Uhh, I don't know, two or three? Jamie might be downstairs or in his room. Which do ya wanna check first?" he asked her, though she had no idea why. How would she know? She shrugged in response.

"His room it is!"

They walked out of Sophie's room and turned down the corner. A boy around eight to ten years old with somewhat messy brown hair and brown eyes was walking into a room, a plate of cookies in hand.

"Hey, Jamie!" Jack called.

Jamie almost dropped his plate. "Jack! I didn't think you would show up again that fast!"

"Well, I did. Hey, do you see anyone around me?" he asked.

The younger's boy made a confused face. "Uh, no. Is there another guardian that I don't believe in there?"

"Not quite..."

Time to see if talking had anything to do with being seen (really, if so, that made absolutely no sense).

"I'm Pippa," she said.

This time Jamie did drop his plate of cookies. "Who said that?!"

Jack tilted his head to one side. "Hold on a sec. You can _hear_ her but can't _see _her?"

"I know someone said, 'I'm Pippa!'," Jamie explained, bending down to pick up his mess. "Did you make Pippa invisible, bring her here, and disguise her voice?"

"Huh? Jack, what does he mean? I don't get what he's talking about." Pippa looked at her brother.

Jack rolled his eyes. "Does that sound like anything Pippa would say?"

"What...?"

"Guess not..." Jamie trailed off. "So who or what's talking?"

"I'm not a what!" the girl shouted.

"He has a friend named Pippa, too," the guardian of fun explained to her. "This isn't your friend, Pippa, she's my sister," he told the boy. "I wonder why you can hear her but can't see her. That's really weird."

"You have a sister! Why didn't you tell me?" he exclaimed.

"Jamie! Who are you talking to?" his mom shouted.

Sophie bounded up the stairs, arms full of obviously stolen cookies. She scurried into her room.

"Sophie, Mom! We're playing a game!" he lied.

"Alright!"

His eyes roamed around the area around Jack. "Let's go in my room and talk," he suggested quietly.

"Eh, no. Sorry, mate, but they're coming with us," a familiar voice. Growling was heard as he finished his sentence.

Jack's shoulder's slumped. "Not again."

Pippa turned around.

The Easter Bunny and two yetis, one holding a burlap sack, exited Sophie's room. Hadn't she just run in there? From their ealier conversation, she could guess Sophie met the rabbit, but it amazed Pippa that she hadn't screamed at the sight of the yetis. Maybe she saw them before, too...?

Either way, the fact they had a giant sack frightened her. She _really_ hoped they weren't going to put her in there.

"What!" Jamie protested. "They just got here!"

"I'm just surprised Sophie's not clingling to his leg," Jack said in a monotone voice.

"Oh, she was excited to see me," the bunny said. "But as much as I would love to play with the ankle-biter, I don't wanna waste any time either. Borrowed some of Sany's sand to put her to sleep. Speaking of which - " He jumped in front of the siblings and threw the same yellow sand Sandy had thrown earlier at Pippa at Jamie. The boy didn't even have time to duck. He dropped the plate, wobbled a bit, and tried to balance himself on the door frame before falling over, asleep. "Sorry, kid. Time to go. There's somethin' important we need to discuss."

"Jamie! Is everything alright? That's the second time I heard banging!"

The yeti with free hands snatched up the siblings in one grab and tossed them in the sack.

Pippa shrieked.

"Oh, come on, Phil!" Jack yelled irritably.

The opening closed. Pippa felt the sack being tossed. She shrieked again. Today was not her day.

**...**

The sun was setting. Little Sophie Bennett was curled up in her bed, where Bunnymund had placed her after putting her to sleep, stuffed bunny in her arms. She dreamed about giant rabbits, giant white dogs standing on two legs, and cookies. Turning over in her sleep, she kicked the covers halfway off and loosened her grip on her toy.

From the shadows the setting sun was casting into her room, a figure arose. He glided across the room and stared disdainfully at the girl's dream. It need a touch of fear, he thought, grinning madly. The figure reached out, sprinkling black dust over the girl's head.

Instantly, the bunnies, cookies, and dogs disappeared. They were replaced with really big, scary, black horsies with yellow eyes. Sophie wimpered in her sleep, clutching her stuffed animal tightly. She didn't like the horsies.

Pitch sneered at the toy. To think, thanks to him, Bunnymund was once reduced to that form, and now he was back to full power! All the guardians were. Thanks to Frost and his group of children. He sprinkled more dust over the girl's head. She was one of those children.

The horsies were chasing her now! Sophie tried to run away, but they were too fast! They were going to run over her!

Pitch chuckled at the child's fear. He decided not to worsen the nightmare any further. He didn't want her adrenaline waking her up.

He had spent the entire night across the world giving very young children nightmares. The process was exhuasting; it would be quite a long time before he was even halfway restored to power, and the exhaustion would disappear. But he had to keep raising their fear to get it to a high enough level to execute his plan. If he worked diligently, he might be able to pull off phase one by tomorrow night.

Satisfied with the girl's nightmare, Pitch recedded back into the shadows. He skipped her pest of a brother; he wasn't scared of him, so there was no point. Yet. Before disappearing completely, he nodded to the blasted fairy flappping it's wings in horror in the corner of the room. Let it tell the guardians he was back. By that point he would already have them where he wanted them.

...

**Alright, I'll keep this short; yes, I made Pitch giving Sophie nightmares. Sorry, but I had to! Poor little girl... As for Pippa and Jamie's friend having the same name, I've seen people argue over that concept. While I'll give that it's far more likely for Jack's sis to have a more biblical name in that time period, it's still possible for it to be 'Pippa'. AND it's not impossible to have the same name as someone else, especially from the past. ****As for their parents names, obviously, I don't them. Does anyone care why I picked those particular names? If so, tell me and I'll post it next chapter. Though I doubt any of you really care.**

_**Guest**_**: Thanks! Sorry for the delay! :(**

_**storygirl99210**_**: Haha, yeah, she's supposed to be real for this story, everyone's just suspicious. I'm happy you thought it turned out fine!**

_**AgentBugs**_**: You know, I'm really starting to love your reviews, haha! Thanks for the compliments and tips. Really appreciated. :D**

_**BlackRose556**_**: I was hoping it would be. :D**

_**Cathy Jo**_**: Thank you! (: I actually worry that the flow gets choppy at times, so thanks for that too, I guess! I really like your questions. Yes, and her backstory will be revealed later on. (By the way, the backstory isn't in her original story, so looking it up wouldn't help.)**

_**oOShinahiOo**_**: Thank you! Both Frosts are the protagonists, I guess. I just write, people can figure who the protagonist, who the villian, ani-hero, secondary-characters, ect. on their own. But I'm glad you like it. :) Yeah, I can understand it about Bunnymund, but with his serious, short tempered-ness and wanting to protect the others (particularly Jack) and children, that's just how he turned out here. You're right about Pippa.**

**As for the Ice Queen, well, how do I put this without spoiling it? Let's just say she's made quite a few questionable decisions in her life and Pippa is important to her in a few ways. I don't know if they knew about Pitch's old life. It's possible they do yet it doesn't matter because of who he is now. Trust me, his story will come up later.**

**Glad you like the story, by the way!**

_**Mystery Girl Who Writes**_**: Thanks! Um, I don't know what River Song is, but okay! :)**

_**Linariel**_**: /Author blushes from compliments/ Thank you! :D I looked for sort of the same kind of story before I thought of writing this. I'm glad you like it!**


	6. Oh No

**Still don't own RotG. Anyone surprised? No? Good. Okay, just to clarify, I have NOT read the books. I HAVE looked at the wiki. I already had an idea of what I thought M.N. (you should be able to figure it out later) might look like before I saw the picture. Besides my plot explaination and the last sentence, I changed her appearance because all the characters appearances were changed somewhat from books to movie. (Example: Bunnymund. I serious, look it up.)**

**Also, someone guessed about the names I picked for Jack's parents since I don't know them. Explaination is in my response below.**

**EXTRA LONG CHAPTER AND SORRY FOR THE LONGER WAIT! Also it might be a little rushed because - well, I did rush.**

Terra Pitchiner rarely left her realm these days. She either saw no need to or had a specific reason(s) to stay. Silvia didn't know which was true (or for what reasoning), but then again, she didn't care much either.

She and Terra hadn't liked each other since the younger girl took away her elemental powers. Their feelings toward one another actually bordered between intense dislike and plain hatred; the only thing keeping it from crossing that line was the very little time they very rarely spent together.

Silvia knew the younger girl's story quite well. After all, hadn't she asked about it when they first met? She just didn't care for it now, much less than the girl herself, and as time went on certain details became fuzzy, eventually slipping her mind completely.

Terra had lived during the Golden Age, the young daughter of General Kozmotis Pitchiner. She was very young - how yong did she say she was at the time? Three to six years old, perhaps? Maybe, maybe not. - when her father left to guard a prison full of nightmares. From how she described the time, Silvia got the impression Terra had a very close bond with her war hero of a father. He even kept a locket with her picture in it with him when he left. Years went by, and Terra never saw her father as her father again. Apparently, the nightmares over-powered him and corrupted his soul.

He became what every young child feared: the Boogeyman.

Later, at age thirteen, Terra somehow died. How she died or how she became Mother Nature, Silvia didn't know. Maybe if she racked her brain, she would pull up the details from the back of her mind. But why waste energy on something as irrelevant and unimportant to her situation as that?

All she knew was that the elements were too much for poor, baby Terra to handle at first. So the Man in the Moon ressurected four humans to _help _her. Silvia had been one of them. She became the winter spirit under Terra, the Snow Queen, who in her rage and self-pity would later turn out to be a horrible choice... In the end, Terra learned to handle her powers quite well and stripped Silvia of her's.

However, this incident - as well as Silvia's story - was a tale for another time.

The Ice Queen hadn't seen Terra in well over five hundred years. They liked to keep their distances, Mother Nature in her garden, the Ice Queen in her Ice Palace (as Pippa had dubbed it) or roaming the world. Silvia thought it was rather unfortunate she would have to visit the dreadful teenager this day.

As she crossed the threshold into Mother Nature's realm, she shuddered. Spring. The season the garden currently represented. Oh, how she longed for her powers back. Silvia would freeze every last inch of the life growing here (and perhaps that dreadful girl). Instead, she focused on the task at hand and walked briskly ahead.

Silvia found the girl crouching near a dead rose bush. Under her touch, the grey, wilted roses came alive, turning blood red, and blooming. They were beautiful. Again, Silvia longed her powers back. She preferred dead roses to living ones. A thick layer of frost would fix that.

Terra looked different than how she remembered. Silvia had expected this; nature changes all the time, so why wouldn't Mother Nature? Her long, dark hair wasn't as wild as it had once been. As always, it was black, but at first glance it might've looked dirt brown. Her eyes had changed to a bright green, reminding the Ice Queen of grass. Her skin had become paler - not much paler, but still whiter than before. She had changed out of her cloud-like dress into one that reminded the Ice Queen of the ocean; blue, green, and grey that rippled liked waves. She had looked somewhat older over five-hundred years ago. Now she resembled a young teenager again. Around her neck was an old necklace, a locket with a picture of a little girl in it. This was the first time Silvia had ever seen it.

"Silvia," she greeted without looking up. Silvia couldn't help but notice the blue sky was suddenly filled with storm clouds.

"Terra," the Ice Queen returned the greeting. "I see you have a picture of yourself around your neck. I didn't think you were so vain."

Terra's other hand instictively reached for the locket. "I got it from Katherine. Mother Goose, you know. It's a family heirloom."

"Really? Was it your mother's? Grandmother's? Or your father's?" she asked in a mocking tone.

Terra glared. Silvia noted how much she looked like Pitch, even with their differences in appearances. Lightning struck the ground less than inch from her parka.

The winter spirit smiled cruelly. "A warning?"

"Yes." Terra returned the smile. "What do you want?"

"Right to the point, I see." She frowned. "I'm actually here because of your father. He's up to no good again."

Terra rolled her eyes and stood up. "My father's schemes have nothing to do with me unless he's trying to tamper with the weather." She gave Silvia a pointed look. "Again. You know he hates seeing me."

The physically older woman laughed. She really did despise Terra. Quick to believe one thing before hearing the truth. "You think I want you to go see him! No, Terra. You don't have to see your petty little garden to visit him." Before the teenager could strike her with lightning, she added, "I want control over winter again."

The temperature increased about thirty-five degrees. How annoying.

"Why?" Mother Nature asked. "What makes you think I'll give you those powers back after what you did? Why do you think you should ever be trusted - "

"Spare me the speech. You have heard of Jack Frost haven't you?" she cut in curtly.

"Of course I know who he is," Terra snapped, frustrated at being interrupted. "Who do you think enables him to create frost, snow, and ice?"

"Are you aware that he has a living little sister?"

Terra didn't respond to this at first. Evidently, she did not, and was trying to figure out what this had to do with anything. "So?" she finally gave in and asked.

"Isn't it true that your father hates the guardians?"

Silvia could see Terra putting the pieces together.

"Jack's become a guardian, hasn't he?" she said.

The Ice Queen nodded. "Yes. He also recently helped defeat Pitch's latest plan to submerge the world in fear and darkness."

The teenager narrowed her eyes. "How do you know he has a younger sister at all, let alone a living one? He's been around for three hun- Silvia Icing, you've been kidnapping again!"

She snorted. Given her reputation, of course Terra would accuse that. What would be the use in explaining that Pippa's case had been different? It wasn't as if the truth would make the slightest difference to her situation. Lying that she'd merely seen the young girl and listened in on enough of her conversations to know her relations would only come back to bite Silvia later. Instead, she avoided the question completely.

"It's been three weeks since his defeat."

"Silvia, I'd wish you quit going back and forth and just explain what's going on, but it's not as if I can trust your word anyhow," she heard the dreadful girl mutter to herself. Louder, she asked, "And?"

Instead of spitting back why she bothered listening to her in the first place, the former Snow Queen ignored the comment. "Isn't it strange that he's already back, out and about, giving children nightmares already? It should take longer for him to recover, shouldn't it?"

Terra's eyes grew wide. "What?"

"I was just wandering around Tokyo when I spotted a child in a car, sleeping, black sand hovering above the poor thing's head. He looked rather uncomfortable himself."

"The child looked uncomfortable?" she repeated.

"Did you think I was talking about Pitch?" Silvia replied sarcastically.

Terra sighed. She reached for the locket and played with it absently. "If that's true, that is a problem. Would you just explain what this all has to do with each other and why it means you should get any power back?"

"I thought you were supposed to be smart," Silvia remarked rudely. "Enough fear to for him to recover and give children nightmares again, no matter how weakened he might be at first, could not have amounted that quickly! None-the-less, he's going to want to get rid of the guardians again - "

"He always wants rid of the guardians."

" - Particularly the newest member, the one who got in his way the most! And now the boy has a weakness: his younger, vulnerable sister. I think Pitch will try to use her to get to Jack Frost somehow. Whether it be destroying him or forcing him to work alongside him, I don't know."

"How touching," Terra commented sarcastically. "You still haven't told me why you should be trusted with winter again. Or, better yet, why you would care about either sibling's well-being, _Ice_ Queen. Are you sure you just don't want to take over the world with him again?"

As if she cared about taking over the world anymore, let alone with Black. Silvia hadn't realized how much her anger was building up until now. If she still had her powers, the garden would surely be experiencing a blizzard right now. Wouldn't that be lovely?

"I understand," she began with gritted teeth, "that what I tried to accomplish several centuries ago was not...appreciated very much. I can tell say though, that I want to do join him as much as you want to want give my control back, leave your garden for good, and run off to join _your father _with_ whatever _his_ plans _are. Are you starting to understand I hate your father as much as you miss his former self yet?"

(Silvia could remember from hearing Terra's story had upset and sad when she talked about her father. She decided to use this to hit the girl with. Evidently, it worked, because the teenaer was now glaring viciously at her.)

"As for Frost and his sister, don't think I care at all for them. It's - " the Ice Queen bit her tounge to keep from telling the truth. " - their situation. I can't stand the thought that Pitch has such a good chance at winning at all. Unlike every other time, I'm not as confident that the guardians will win this time."

Terra reguarded her cooly. "Uh-huh. I see. There are still holes in your story. Like how the girl escaped from you. I thought you had your ways of locking them in your realm."

"I let her go near her brother. She was becoming annoying to deal with."

"Why around her brother?"

"I'm not cruel enough to leave a child alone without anybody it knows within a hundred miles, depite what you might believe about me."

Terra's eyebrows knitted together in contempt. Silvia could tell she was holding back many 'comments' as she said, "I still don't have a single reason to give you any power back! I also can't see why you would think I would ever be convinced of your tale. And, even if I did believe you, the most I would do is tell the guardians what you told me. Get out of my garden before I raise the temperature to over a hundred degrees!"

That would certainly annoy Silvia enough to push her away.

"Did I forget to mention," Silvia added with fake cheerfulness, "that if Pitch were to succeed with his plans, summer, spring, and fall would cease to exist and you would have to leave this place, _face your father_, and restore them? That would take an awfully long time, wouldn't it?"

Terra growled. It was all Silvia could do not to laugh at their predicament. To think, she was angering that dreadful teenager so much with one conversation!

"Fine," she spat. "I'll give you your silly powers back. Note that I'll also be telling the guardians about our encounter and to keep a close eye on you. After all, what better way to stop him than to have allies who are always looking out for you?" Terra smiled sweetly.

The Ice Queen frowned. She hoped Terra wouldn't mention what she'd said about Pippa. It would be a shame if the little girl came to resent her. She hoped it didn't interfere with what she was about to do either.

Spitefully, the young Pitchiner walked up to her and looked Silvia in the eye. "This is only temperorary. Plus, if your lying to me, I'll make sure your realm melts as well as take your powers away."

"I understand. Can we move along now?"

She just barely dodged being struck by lightning.

**...**

Jack was starting to think Phil didn't like him. Okay, he _knew_ Phil didn't like him, starting with the first time Jack tried to break in to North's workshop. The yeti had personally picked him up and threw him out the window the teenager had busted open. Ever since, he'd been somewhat of a thorn in Phil's side, but was that really reason enough to toss the sack through the portal ten times harder than that other yeti had weeks ago? Some people just couldn't take a joke every so often. Well, Jack could understand that. And he knew when to stop. After he 'accidently' knocked over all of Phil's toys and froze them to the ground, he would leave the yeti alone for a... month. No, two weeks.

Grinning deviously, Jack crawled out of the bag. Phil had already returned to his station nearby, painting blocks fit for kindergardeners various shades or green, blue, red, and white. As he got closer, the yeti narrowed his eyes, growling, obviously seeing the boy. The teenager smiled innocently. Then whipped his staff at the blocks, knocking them off the table. Dropping his paintbrush, Phil roared as Jack froze the toys to the ground. He actually looked like he was about to strangle Jack. Hmm, time to leave!

He skipped back over to where Bunny was standing.

"Done messing around yet?" Bunny scowled.

"Depends; why did you throw us in a bag again?" he asked. He was debating whether to play another prank on the kangaroo now or later.

"For freezin' my carrot garden. Get yer sister, we have to see the others right away," the aussie replied curtly.

Oh, right, the meeting that cut their time with Jamie short. Later it was. Jack twisted around to look at his sister, who was shaking on the floor near the sack.

"That was...mean!" she gasped. "And that's a stupid reason to do that! To think I use to like Easter!"

The Easter Bunny rolled his eyes. "Sorry, kid. But like I said, we don't have time to waste. C'mon." He walked towards North's office.

Pippa glared at Jack.

Jack took a step back, surprised. He held up his hands in surrender. "What did I do?"

"You just had to freeze his carrots."

Great, now his own sister was on Bunny's side again. Shoulders slumping, he said, "Why don't we follow the kangaroo already?"

North, Sandy, and Tooth were waiting in North's office, talking in hushed voices. When Bunny opened the door, they stopped. Okay, now Jack was suspicious. They didn't still think Pippa was the Ice Queen's pawn, did they? This was getting really old, really fast.

North smiled brightly. "How was your entrance? Was it enjoyable?"

"Enjoyable?!" Pippa shrieked. "Why would anyone like being forced in a bag and thrown through - through - whatever brought us here! That was the most terrifying thing in my life!"

The large man frowned. "I guess Jack is more fun-loving sibling. Makes sense, he is guardian of fun."

Pippa had a look on her face that was both confused and irritated. Jack shook his head. North, apparently, still hadn't figured out sarcasm yet. Well, he wasn't going to explain it to him (or his sister) right now.

Waving a hand as if to dismiss the topic, North started, "I digress. Tooth stated you found little girl's grave?"

"Yeah." Jack hopped up and balanced himself on his staff. His sister stared at him curiously. He ignored it. "It had the year I died on it and what looked like 'missing' written on it. She even opened her baby teeth container-thing. So she's the real thing, alright?"

"We know," Tooth agreed. "There's just a _one_ more thing..."

"The kid needs to tell us exactly how she got involved with the Ice Queen," Bunny continued.

Pippa groaned. "For the last time, she's not evil!"

"Either way, we gotta know. Even if your really his sister, she could still be using you," he said to Jack.

Tooth smiled at the younger girl. "Can you tell us what happened, sweetie?"

Pippa didn't say anything. She lokeds down at her hands, suddenly fascinated with them. Jack balanced himself on one foot. She didn't want to talk about it. Why?

"Pippa?"

She sighed. "Fine. It was just after Jack - died. I started crying and screaming. She was suddenly behind me, asking me why I was being so loud. I couldn't talk right, so she guessed that someone fell through the ice, which did happen. I asked her to save him but she wouldn't. She just stared at the sky and said no."

"Still has an icy heart, I see," Bunny muttered, leaning against one wall.

The little girl didn't seem to hear. "She did tell me she could help me see him again. But I would never see anyone else again. I didn't understand what she meant. At first I thought she would kill me, too, and I got scared. It was almost as if she read my mind, because she said she wasn't trying to hurt me. She couldn't help Ja- "

"I thought you said she wouldn't, not couldn't," North interrupted.

"I think she said, 'will not, cannot' or something," Pippa replied. "She could help me see him again, though. I - I didn't really want to leave everyone behind, but I felt so guilty about Jack - it was my fault he was gone, if he didn't save me he wouldn't have died - I didn't know if I was thinking right. So I went with her. Oh, and she said she didn't give people that choice often."

"Because she kidnaps, not offers," Bunny retorted.

"Be quiet, kangaroo."

Jack smirked at the insult. His sister was picking up his habits when it came to his rival. What big brother wouldn't be happy at that?

"She took me to her palace. I asked her where we were but she didn't give me a straight answer. I never told her my name but she still knew it. I was never allowed to leave and she was gone a lot. When she did come back, she talked to me about the guardians, the boogeyman - _who she really doesn't like _- and would ask me about my life at home and Jack. She even told me her real name."

"Silvia Icing?" North guessed.

The girl noddd. "Yeah. I kept asking her when I would get to see Jack again. She just told me to be patient. I was really getting sick of it. Then this morning she said I could see him again. She took me to where Jack was and - well, pointed me in the right direction. She did say his 'allies didn't like her much', which is apparently true." She scowled.

The other guardians ganced at each other, worried. What could possibly be wrong with her story? It sounded fine to Jack. At least Pippa hadn't been hurt while she was there. What was their problem now?

"Anything else?" North pressed.

Pippa pressed her lips together tightly and shook her head.

"You're absolutely positive?" Bunny asked gently.

Aww, he did have a heart, Jack thought sacastically.

"...Yes. And I never saw any other kids there either."

Tooth explained, "We really do need to know everything, Pippa. I know you believe the Ice Queen's a kind woman, and I realize she could have changed over the years. On the other hand, she did lose her powers over winter. She might have known Jack would be resurrected and took you in just to use you. After the dark ages, I wouldn't put it past her."

Pippa hesitated. She stared at her hands again. Jack jumped off his staff and knelt down. "Is that everything?"

"Well... She never like talking about herself much. All she told me, 'sides her name was that the moon brought her back to life. She wouldn't even tell me why the guardians didn't like her," she told them. "I really don't think she's evil at all. If she did do anything before, she's changed now. But she was really secretive..."

"How were you able to see her?" Bunny asked. "You had to of believed in her to see her."

"I don't know. I'd never heard of the Ice Queen before then. But, while we were at that house, the girl, Sophia, was it?"

"Sophie," the bunny corrected.

"Sophie couldn't see me until I said something, and Jamie couldn't see me at all but he could hear me."

Tooth made a confused noise in her throat. "That doesn't make any sense at all."

The younger girl shrugged. "Like I said, I don't know..."

Sandy suddenly looked around, then at Tooth. He conjured a picture above his head. It had nothing to do with what Pippa just said. It was a picture of Babytooth and a question mark.

Tooth gasped, realization striking her. "Where's Babytooth? She hasn't reported back yet! Jack?"

Somehow, Jack had forgotten all about the mini-fairy. He hadn't realized she was missing from the group at all. How did he not notice she wasn't flapping her wings around his head? "I... I thought she was here."

"Do you think something happened to her? I have to go find her!" Tooth exclaimed. Feathers started falling off her body in worry.

"Ew," he heard his sister mutter quietly, only loud enough for him to hear. "She's not going to be naked, is she?"

Jack felt his ears heat up at the thought. The temperature in the room dropped about twenty degrees. "Pippa, shut up! No!" he whispered back.

"What are you two whispering 'bout?" Bunny snapped, rubbing his arms at the sudden cold.

"How Tooth's shedding," Pippa explained before Jack could make up a lie.

If Tooth heard them, she pretended not to notice. "I need to go check on the others! I'll be right back!" With that, the Tooth Fairy zipped out the door.

"This is not good," North said, expression changing from curious to serious. "It is possible Pitch and Silvia are working together again. Kidnapping the fairies again, maybe?"

The little girl groaned loudly. "How many times do I have to say it? The Ice Queen hates the Boogeyman!"

North glanced out the window and back at Pippa. "Whatever the case, it is getting late. Dark outside. Little girl should get some sleep."

Jack breifly wondered if they had something important they wanted to talk about without Pippa around again. One thing was for sure, this entire situation was getting annoying. He'd heard the stories, both on how the Ice Queen was a bad guy and how she took care of his sister for three hundred years. The suspicion was getting old way too fast for one day, and frankly, the idea that some old lady was as big of a probem as Pitch, if not worse, was just stupid.

"I'm not tired," Pippa replied hotly. "And I'm not going to sleep!" She jumped behind Jack, as if to hide from Sandy.

"What is it now?" Jack asked them, exasperated.

"What? Nothing. I just thought she would be tired after everything that has happened is all."

Okay, that was a good reason, but it didn't shake off Jack's suspicion.

"I am hungry, though," Pippa said quieter from behind him.

"The elves should've brought cookies by now," North rubbed his chin. "I wonder where they could be..."

"You'd actually share?" Bunny raised an eyebrow.

Pippa must've been getting bored, because she asked him, "Can we leave now?"

"Not yet," Jack said.

She huffed. "Fine. Then can I go find the elves with cookies?"

"Go on ahead," North answered first.

She quickly took off out the door. Jack scowled.

An image of Tooth's mini-fairies appeared above Sandy's head, then a picture of Pitch, then one of the woman in the parka.

"I don't know..." North replied. "Is it possible none of this is connected?"

"Can't be," Bunny disagreed. "The Ice Queen suddenly appears with Frostbite's sister right after we beat Pitch? Can't be coincidence."

"What about Babytooth?"

"Why else would she go missing?"

Sandy turned to Jack. The question mark was back.

"What do I think?" he interperated.

The Sandman nodded.

"I think this is really stupid. Babytooth probably went to collect teeth. Maybe one of the neighbors kids lost a tooth and fell asleep so she would visit early. Who knows? Besides, how do we know Pitch is back, anyway? It's been, what? Not even a month since we kicked his butt?" he said.

The other three considered this.

"Maybe," Bunny relented. "You might be right. Pitch might not be involved at all. Except, the Ice Witch - Queen - is still a threat. We don't know what she's planning or what she'd doing."

"So? We can take her if she tries anything. IF she tries anything. So can we drop this now?" he demanded.

North sighed. "Jack, I don't think you understand how dangerous she can be - "

"She had her powers taken away, didn't she?" he interrupted. "How can she be dangerous if she has zero power?"

"'Cause she's not stupid," Bunny answered curtly. "Silvia's very manipulative when she wants to be. Once she puts her mind to somethin' she won't stop until she's won or been beat. Get on her bad side and she come after you full force when she can, powers or not."

"How would you know that?" Jack asked.

"She didn't stop kidnapping after Mother Nature took her powers away. You know how hard it was getting past her and to the kids - ?"

The doors suddenly burst open. Five elves rushed in the room, tripping over themselves and the platter of cookie crumbs one was holding. They attempted to pull themselves up, only to knock another one down again. It was a moment before a sixth appeared at the door. He shook his head at the other five as if he weren't as clumsy as them. He looked up at the guardians and held up a piece of brown cloth.

"What is that?" Jack asked the tiny creature. It scurried over to Jack and pointed to the cloth, then him. "Huh?"

The elf pouted. He pointed to Jack and the cloth again before out the door.

"I don't follow," Bunny said. "North?"

Rubbing his chin, North walked over to the elf. "What?"

The elf's face turned red and he appeared to be getting mad. He reached out and grasped Jack's leg. He pointed to the brown cloth and the brown trousers. North scratched his head, confused. "You want Jack's pants?"

Occupied with the sixth elf, no one had noticed the other five leave and come back with a box of lettered blocks. They did notice, however, when one of the yetis stomped through the door, roaring at the elves.

"What's this?" North asked the yeti. It pointed to the elves scattering the blocks around the floor. "I have no idea what they're doing. Don't you have toys to make?" The yeti slapped its forehead.

Jack leaned over to see what exactly they were doing. When the elves finally stepped away, the blocks in the middle apparently spelled something out. Up-side-down 'G', sideways 'H', a right side 'r', and a right side 'i'. The last elf pointed to the cloth, Jack, and door for the third time.

"I'm a 'giri'?" he guessed. "I still don't get it."

"Strange little buggers," Bunny muttered to himself.

Sandy - who no one noticed - seemed to get it. He started to jump and down with a picture of what they were trying to say above his head. North seemed to understand too. Smiling widely, he cried, "Girl! They are trying to spell 'girl'!"

"So?" the Easter Bunny questioned.

Sandy, getting impatient, flew above the blocks, pointing at the image above his head.

"Ohhh, Pippa," Jack realized. "What's the cloth got to do with anything?" One of the elves tugged at the strings tied around the botton of his trousers. "Hey, knock that off!"

"I think they tore her dress, mate," Bunny said.

Jack kicked his leg away from the elf. "Why?"

The tiny creatures dove for the blocks again. Sandy floated to the side. When they finished there was an up-side-down 'p' that everyone would've thought was a 'b' if not for the line above it, a sideways 'H', right side 't' backwards 'c' and a right side 'h'.

North gasped. "That is rude and inappropriate!"

"That's harsh, especially for the elves," Bunny commented. "I didn't know they knew how to spell, let alone swear words."

Jack's face was livid. He 'tapped' his staff against four of the elves, freezing them, before one of the last two got the idea to flip the 'p' to the right position.

"...'Pitch'," North read. "Pitch!" He stood up quickly. "Pitch took her?"

The two elves (who had moved FAR away from Jack and huddled close together) nodded vigorously.

"WHAT?!" Jack shouted. Questions and worry flooded his mind. Pitch had Pippa? What? How! When the heck had he done that?! She'd only been gone for about five minutes before the elves came crashing in! Wouldn't there have been more of a commotion than half a dozen elves panicking!? Where were the yetis? Why hadn't they done anything? Why hadn't she screamed? Where did he take her? Why did he take her!? They had to save her!

"Well that solves the problem of if Pitch is involved," Bunny said dryly.

"We have to go save her! Now!" the older Frost shouted.

"Just a minute, Frost," a new voice pipped up.

The guardians and elves looked behind them. Standing behind North's desk was a girl in a weird dress that looked just a couple years younger than him.

"Mother Nature?" Bunny said, surprised.

"Who else?" the girl snapped.

...

_**storygirl99210**_**: Yay! :) I'll explain it later in the story.**

_**DoctorWhotaliaandtheOlympian s**_**: First of all, thanks! Second - that's actually a good guess - though not really close, sorry.**

**I picked 'Johnathan' because Jack's full name, Jackson, kind of means (according to a website I found) 'son of Jack'. Jack is a nickname for John, which is short for Johnathan. So, yeah. 'Franklin' because it's old enough and would've been used in their time period. 'Mary' because it IS a biblical name - a common thing, 'Mary' being a really common name a couple hundred years ago. 'Alice' because I wanted to use the name, and it references Alice in Wonder, who kind of enters another world, which Jack also does (sort of enters another world as Jack Frost the sprite[?]). 'Overland-Frost' is the fact that Frost is her married name and Overland is her maiden name. That's (my reasoning) why Jack's middle name is Overland. Back then, people often gave the mother's maiden name as their son's first or middle name.**

**Obviously, I put too much thought into these. :P**

_**BlackRose556**_**: Thanks, really! /Snatches cookie happily./ Revenge and North probably thought Pippa would find it fun. xD**

_**Linariel**_**: I'm glad you liked it and thank you! :D I hoped people would like the stuffed bunny part. Maybe I'm weird (I am), but I crack up at the idea of Sophie getting a toy that looks like a weakened Bunnymund. The seeing/hearing thing will be explained in a later chapter. I would be scared, too, very scared! xD. I agree about Pippa's name. Personally, it's my favorite and I do like other's ideas, yet it feels weird reading it, whether the author uses Pippa or something else. o.O**

_**Mystery Girl Who Writes**_**: Thanks for the explaination. And trust me, I'm a huge dork in other things, too. :)**

_**Rocky Pond**_**: Updated and thanks. :)**

_**the bushy haired know-it-all**_**: Haha, kay. :)**

_**theHuntress101**_**: Finally updated! (:**


	7. Agitation

**Disclaimer: I am**_** not **_**the creator of Rise of the Guardians and I do not make a profit off of my use of them in a fanfiction, for which I do not have permission to use. Therefore - THEY'RE NOT MINE! -Disclaimer over- :)**

**Ugh, I really don't like how this chapter turned out but I didn't want to keep you guys waiting anymore! By the way, I've had important tests this week and finals next week, so I'm not sure how long the next chapter will take either! D:**

**...**

"Cookies, cookies, elves with cookies~" Pippa sang quietly. As she tried to stay out of yetis' way she looked around for the elves that supposedly had cookies. One yeti didn't see her, nearly stepping on her, causing the young girl to jump to the side in fear.

She had a feeling Jack din't want her to leave his side. Except, she didn't want to stay in the room debating whether or not the Ice Queen was evil. Especially since she was starting to doubt her. Why was the older woman so secretive, anyway? Was she hiding something really bad? Well, there was the kidnapping and working with an enemy information she hid. At first Pippa thought it all a lie, but now she wasn't so sure. She didn't want to think about it either.

Pippa heard bells jingling and the sound of cookies being crunched under one of the nearby tables. She perked up. Found them! Kneeling down, she crawled under the nearest one, careful to avoid the yetis' feet. Three elves were sitting on the floor, surrounding a plate of cookies crumbs and one cookie, mouths full. She couldn't surpress a giggle.

At the sound the elves looked up at her in terror. One snatched the last cookie and held it close to his chest, as if she were about to steal it. The other two glared at him. They each tried to pry the treat away as he pull the cookie back. Pippa was surprised it didn't crumble. Two more elves must've heard the noise from their bells because they came racing under the table, too. Now five elves were fighting over the cookie. Pippa laughed harder.

The yetis' working around the table growled. Another elf was suddenly kicked under the table. It looked dazed for a moment before picking up the tray. It glared at the others, face turning red. The younger Frost shook her head happily.

"Pippa?" she heard Jack's voice.

He poked his head under the table with them.

"Hi, Jack," she greeted cheerfully. "Look at the elves! They're being fun- Huh?" The elves had stopped fighting. They were staring at Jack oddly, as if they couldn't figure out what he was. Pippa cocked her head. "Uh, well they were, anyway..."

Her brother was unfazed. "Come on, let's go outside. The others are still talking. It was getting boring listening to them! Let's go have a snowball fight!"

"Um, okay." The elves' stares were unsettling. Did they usually do that when they saw Jack? Either way, she started to crawl out from under the table. "Uh, isn't it too cold outside here? I mean, it is the north pole, right?"

"Yeah, that's why we're leaving," he retorted.

Pippa stood up. "What about the others?"

He raised an eyebrow, stuffing his hands in his pockets. "Someone'll get us later. Do you want to leave or not?"

By now the yetis had paused their work and were glaring at Jack. Pippa started to think something was wrong. "Jack?" she wimpered.

Her brother sighed. "Sorry. I'm just kind of stressed out. Come on let's go." He smiled playfully.

The feeling that something was wrong didn't go away, yet she followed him. The yetis returned to their work, although some still watched them. The elves shortly followed, scrambling after them, one holding the empty plate. Jack led her to an empty hall and stopped, standing very still for a minute.

Pippa, growing nervous, soon took a step back. The Jack she knew couldn't stay still for longer than fifteen seconds. "Jack?"

The elves were tugging on her dress, trying to pull her away. Pippa resisted their tugs (which was not very hard). She had to find out what was wrong. "Jackson?" she asked again.

Jack turned around. Black colored sand formed behind him. He spoke, yet the voice wasn't his. It was older and not the right timbre. "Time to leave, little girl."

Now Pippa was beyond scared. It wasn't Jack! It was - was - Hadn't the Ice Queen told her about black sand? What had she said?

_"Pitch typically uses a type of dream sand to give out nightmares. It's black instead of gold. Stay away from it."_

She spun around, squeaking in terror, ready to run. Unfortunately, the look-alike grabbed her by the back of her collar and yanked her away. A small piece of her dress ripped in the elves' hands. They looked at it in horror before turning to run. Pippa watched them go, struggling to get away from the fake.

She tried to scream, "JAC-" only to be thrown into the sand. The fake disappeared along with it.

Meanwhile, the yetis saw the elves running around, panicked-faced. The girl wasn't with them. Phil walked in at that moment and barked something in yeti, telling them to get back to work. They looked at each other and shrugged. Oh well. If something was wrong the guardians would take care of it.

**...**

"Where's Toothiana?" the girl asked. "She should be here."

"She is checking her fairies at moment," North explained. "One is missing. What brings you here, Terra?"

"Hold on," Jack said, momentarily distracted from the situation. He'd never met Mother Nature before but he - obviously, considering he posessed winter abilities - knew who she was. Somehow, he'd imagined her a lot older. "She's Mother Nature? Isn't she a little...young?"

Terra turned to look at him. "Ah," she murmured, disreguarding his statements completely, "so you're Jack Frost in person. The one whom I had to lend winter powers for MiM."

"What?" Jack didn't know what she was talking about. 'Lend'? What did that mean? His powers were - Reality then kicked in and he shook his head. Whatever she was talking about could wait until later. "Nevermind. Whatever you're here about, can it wait? We have to go find Pi- "

"Pitch Black?" Terra interrupted. "Yes, I know. His nightmares took the form of Jack and led a girl in the corridors through a dark portal. Once she realized it wasn't Jack leading her she tried to run, only to be tossed through - "

"You were there!?" Jack yelled. "_Why didn't you do anything_?" He couldn't believe it; someone who was there, who could've helped his sister get away from that monster, flat out didn't!

The younger looking girl rolled her eyes, as if what she just described was unimportant (furthering to tick off the boy). "I needed to make sure she was telling the truth. Besides, I have no control over nightmares or that black sand he uses."

"She'?" North repeated questionably.

"Who?" Bunny asked firmly.

Jack gripped his staff tightly and hunched his shoulders, upper lip curling angerly. He ignored Sandy's hand gestures to not do anything. Through gritted teeth, he repeated, "'To make sure she was telling the truth'? YOU LET MY SISTER BE TAKEN BY THAT CREEP TO MAKE SURE SOMEONE WAS TELLING THE TRUTH?"

(It was at that moment Tooth zipped back into the room, Babytooth hovering anxiously beside her. She looked as if she had something to say, but stopped when she saw Terra and Jack. Terra nodded once at Tooth. Jack didn't notice her at all.)

Terra sat down behind the desk and crossed her arms. "Will you let me explain my reasoning?"

"WHY WOULD - HOW - " Jack couldn't think of which question to demand first or how to phrase it. "_Explain_," he finally relented.

Bunny walked over and put a paw on the winter sprirt's shoulder. "Calm down, mate," he hissed. "Ya don't want to get on her bad side either."

"Silvia -the_ Ice_ Queen - told me Pitch Black was up to something only a few weeks after being defeated," Terra began. "That shouldn't have happened so soon. There shouldn't be - "

"We already know Pitch is back!" Jack snapped.

"Jack!" North barked. He scowled at the older teenager.

Surprised at his sudden tone and glare, Jack winced and recoiled slightly. Guess what this girl had to say was really that important for him to yell. That, or North was getting impatient with his attitude. Well he couldn't help it. He was getting more and more nervous about Pippa's safety by the minute, which meant he was getting more and more agitated.

"She did?" Tooth asked. "Why would she do that?"

Jack's head snapped towards Tooth. When had she gotten back? He saw Babytooth nearby and calmed down slightly. At least she was alright. That was a relief. He'd have to ask what happened to her later. Turning back to Terra, he scowled. "Get to the part where you let my sister get kidnapped."

"Careful, Frost, or you might find all your snow melting as soon as it appears," Mother Nature threatened. "Look, I know you're angry, but let me finish before we all regret wasting so much time. You don't want to waste the entire night talking and screaming when your sister is in Pitch's grasp, would you?"

Jack grimaced. She was right, he didn't want to waste time. He had to get Pippa away from Pitch as soon as possible. The boy ignored Tooth and North's concerned expressions. "Just get on with it."

"Thank you. Now, it should've taken him a lot longer to recover, no? Not too many children, if any at all, were currently scared of him before today. He should've been locked away in his lair for a long time. Obviously, a power house of fear had to of appeared. If it had been just a few regular kids, he could leave, but not do much harm. Yet. However, young children around the world have been having nightmares lately. More than just a few, from where I've checked so far. I wonder what that power house is?"

"I don't understand," Bunny said. "Silvia told you this?"

"I'll explain it later," Terra replied. "Let me finish first. The girl - Frost's sister - she was taken by Silvia, yes? For three hundred years that kid lived with her. That _kid_. No doubt she learned the boogeyman was real before today."

"So?" Jack snapped impatiently. How long would this explaination take? If this girl didn't hurry it up he would just fly out on her to Pitch's lair.

"I don't what happened in Silvia's realm during that time," Terra continued. "But any childhood fears towards the boogeyman could have resurfaced when she realized he was real. Those fears could have possibly strengthened over time, due to the fact there was no doubt he was real then. That kind of fear building up for three hundred years? Definately more than an ordinary amounty. I realize she might not've known about any of this until recently, though. Which brings me to my next point."

"And that is?" North asked.

Terra turned her gaze to Jack. "Him."

Jack raised an eyebrow. _What_? "Me? What do I have to do with - "

"You've faced Pitch before, meaning you realize how much of a threat he is," she started counting off on her fingers. "The girl is your baby sister, whom you died for, and thought was dead herself until recently. Judging by your out of character attitude - don't think I don't know how you normally act, you control a seasonal element for goodness' sake - you're worried out of your mind about her right now. I also assume you've been told about the Ice Queen's history with Black." Terra put her hand down. "Surely you have been scared of losing her all day and now that she's gone your fear for her safety has sky-rocketed. Am I right?"

Jack was taken aback. His face dropped, shock replacing anger again. That was - exactly right. So, she was saying he and Pippa were the cause of Pitch's return? On one hand he wanted to rebuff the accusation. On the other, that made sense. Jack was starting to find he really didn't like this girl.

Terra took his silence as confirmation. "I thought so. Now, about Silvia. She came to me to my realm to inform me of Pitch's return."

"Why would you care about that?" Jack asked, shock fading back into agitation. "I didn't see you around trying to stop him last time."

"Jack, not everyone gets involved against Pitch at once," Tooth hurridly explained. "Some of us just can't get involved sometimes. Whether its because of busy-ness, lack of enough belief, or perso- "

"I only get involved when he threatens my domain," Terra interrupted. "Unlike three weeks ago, there's a possibility he'll threaten the seasons this time. Otherwise, I'm neutral."

"You said you watch me," he paraphrased her earlier words. "Pitch offered me to join him last time. Fear and cold working together. Wouldn't that have threatened you?"

Terra smiled a sickenly sweet smile. "Yes. Yet you refused. I didn't think you would join him. If you had you would've been stripped of your powers, just like Silvia was. But it wasn't in your nature or best interest to join him."

"Can we get back to the Ice Witch - I mean Queen?" Bunny said, irritated again.

Terra nodded. "I apologize." (She didn't sound sorry to Jack.) "Of course I was suspicious of why she would warn anyone, let alone me. She says she wasn't confident the guardians would win this time. She thought the fact that the girl would prove to be a weakness to all of you, especially Jack."

"She was concerned for us? For _Jack_?" Tooth repeated, stunned.

"'Confident'?" Bunny snorted.

The younger girl shrugged. "Truth or lie, she had a catch. She wanted to 'help', I suppose. Silvia asked for her powers over winter to be returned."

"What!" North and Tooth yelled.

Sandy gaped.

"You didn't give 'em back, did you?" Bunny quickly asked. "That'd be insane! She can't be trusted - "

"If you keep interrupting, I'll shove an egg in your mouth and down your throat!" Terra raised her voice, standing up abruptly.

Jack, two seconds away from ditching the group, wondered why that sounded familiar. Now that he thought about it, this girl _was_ giving off a familiar vibe. It was probably because of fact they were both associated with nature. ...Right...? Ugh, that wasn't important right now, he thought.

Bunny grumbled something under his breath. Jack caught part of it. "Bossy little...his daughter...worse than Frostbite on Easter..."

"I'll cut to the chase," Terra snapped. "I TEMPORARILIY gave her her powers back. Watch her. Don't let her get away with anything. Good-bye!"

With that, the younger girl disappeared in a swirl of colorful flowers and wind.

"_WHAT_!" four of the guardians screamed. Sandy's eye twitched.

The older Frost groaned, lifting his hand to cover his face. First Pitch, now a fully powered, supposedly-dangerous-without-them woman in the way of protecting his sister. Oh yes, today was getting better and better!

**...**

Pippa had been thrown into a bronze cage suspended from the ceiling. She was some sort of giant, grey room filled with the same kind of cages. She hadn't seen anyone else since she got there, not even her captor. Had Pitch made the fake Jack? More than likely. So, was this his lair?

Pippa really didn't want to find out. She had to get out of there. But how? Oh, the box! She reached into her pocket and pulled out the white, velvet box. All she to do was open it and - no, she couldn't look for her palace (or however it worked) when she was locked up. Pippa put it back in her pocket, dispaired.

What would Jack do when he found out she was gone? Save her, she knew that. Unless he didn't know where she was. And how would he? It wasn't like she was with him when she got kidnapped. She wished now she had stayed with him.

Meanwhile, Pitch watched the girl sulk from a dark corner. He smiled wickedly. Yes, everything was going according to plan!

**...**

_**AgentBugs**_: **Sorry I forgot to respond to your review! I wrote those up quickly at two-something in the morning and somehow over looked it! Thanks and it made me laugh (I have no idea why I found the knife threat as funny as I did). Again sorry!**

_**storygirl99210**_**: :D We'll see...**

_**Linariel**_**: YAY, I'm happy they do. I had no idea what her real name was when I wrote it, I just took that from the latin/Italian/possibly Roman word meaning 'Earth'. When I looked at the wiki, it didn't have her real name at the time, but the last time I looked at it since, it said her real name was 'Seraphina'. (Which peeves me, since I was double-checking at the time for her real name to use, other-wise I would make one up. -.- )/Author blushes from comments/ :D Thank you, a lot! Happy (late) Holidays to you too!**

_**Guest**_**: I'll try not to! :)**


	8. The Story Repeats?

**What do you know, I still don't own Rise of the Guardians. Shocker, eh? No? Glad we're on the same page. Do I own the Snow Queen? Nope, I do not! Now, onto the story!**

The next morning was Saturday, which meant no school for Jamie. He was glad to get out of the house after his mom almost took him to the hospital last night when she found him passed out in the hallway. That was a mess to explain. Sophie skipped along on the sidewalk next to him, dressed in a green and blue outfit and tutu. She was clutching her stuffed rabbit in her hands, babbling cheerfully about something or other.

The two were heading for the library; Jamie's book (_The Lochness Monster and Other Mythical Sea Creatures_) was due to today and Sophie had wanted to come with him. At first he told her no, then changed his answer when she went running off to their mom. Honestly, he couldn't see why she would want to go the library with him. She couldn't read and he was just going to return the book and check out a new one.

As Sophie babbled on about bunnies and giant dogs, Jamie thought about last night. Why couldn't he see Jack's sister? He could certainly hear her, so why didn't he see her? He knew she wasn't a guardian. Could that be why? No, he couldn't see OR hear Jack when he wasn't one. Jack's sister wasn't anyone he believed in, right? Could that be it? He knew she existed thanks to Jack, he just didn't know who she was? Eh, maybe. Jamie decided to look up winter spirits again when he got to the library. (The last time he did that was a few days after he met Jack. There hadn't been much information he could find.)

"Jamie!" Sophie squealed. "Can you wead me a story?"

"Is that why you wanted to come?" he asked. "Sophie, I'm doing research!"

His younger sister pouted. "Story!" She held up her toy definately. "Bunny says so! Or you won't any eggs for East-or!"

The ten year old shook his head. He decided against telling her the toy wasn't the real Easter Bunny (again). "Fine. But _after_ I get a new book."

"Yaaayy! Story! Hop, hop, hop!" the girl cheered, literally hopping up to the library doors.

Jamie followed and opened the door. He dropped the book through the return slot at the front desk.

"Come on!" Sophie babbled excitedly, grabbing his hand and dragging him to the children's section. "Story!"

"I said after, Sophie!" he groaned, trying to pull his hand away.

"Story first! Bunny says so!"

Sophie eventually let go of his hand, plopping down on the brightly colored carpet. She hugged her toy to her chest, staring at her brother expectantly.

Jamie sighed. Okay, he would read her a stupid story, _then_ look for a book about winter beings. At least he would get her out of his way (unless she wanted another story). He looked at the illistrated covers of the books on the nearest shelf. "Okay, what do you want to hear? Cinderella? Snow White?" He glanced at the next book and his sister's toy, cringing at the irony. "...Peter Cottontail?"

Sophie wanted to hear a long story. Mainly because she wanted her brother to spend a long time with reading to her. She'd already heard those stories before, and they were really short. She gently placed her stuffed bunny on the carpet as if he might break otherwise. Sophie woddled past her brother to an ailse for older children. She couldn't read what their spines said so she looked for the thickest one. She looked at the spines as Jamie came up behind her.

"No, Sophie. These ones are too complicated for -"

"This one!" she cried, pulling the book she deemed the biggest off the shelf. "Wead."

Jamie raised his eyebrows at the cover. It was of a pale woman in a white parka, whose eyes shone like diamonds. She stood in front of a palace that appeared to be made of ice. The sides of the palace faded into pictures of a blonde boy staring hard at a lake filled with letters and a dark haired girl reaching out for him. _The Snow Queen_ by Hans Christian Anderson, edited by Andrew McFarlen.

Huh. Well, that was one way to kill two birds with one stone. He picked up the book. "Alright."

Sophie laughed excitedly and ran back to her toy. Jamie sat down next to her, crossing his legs. He opened the book to find a table of contents.

1. Preface

2. The Devil's Mirror

3. Kai and Gerda

4. The Garden

5. The Prince and Princess

6. The Little Robber Girl

7. The Lapland Woman and Finland Woman

8. The Snow Queen's Palace

The preface was pretty short. It wasn't even a full page long.

_'The Snow Queen' (known as 'Snedronningen' in Danish) was first published in 1845 by Anderson, being one of his largest stories. 'The Snow Queen' has been edited and re-published many times. This version of the tale I tried to make more understandable to younger children (although I think I failed), although some elements of the story are slightly more mature than someone such as a toddler could understand._

_The story revolves around two children, Kai (Kay in some versions), who is enchanted by a twisted mirror and taken by the Snow Queen, and Gerda, his childhood friend who searches desperately for him._

_I first heard about Anderson's story when I was ten. At the time I was questioning the idea of Jack Frost (a character I had seen in an old movie) when my older sister brought home a book of fairy tales for my younger sister. I shared a room with her at the time and often listened to my older sister read them. When it came to Anderson's story, I was fascinated by the elements he put in it (though I didn't fully understand them). Sometimes I wondered if the Snow Queen was real. Where else could Anderson have gotton the idea? Maybe she told it to him. Either way, I hope the reader enjoys the story as much as I did when I first found it._

_- A. M._

"Jamie!" Sophie whined. "Wead, pwease!"

"Uh, Sophie, are you sure you want me to read this? It says it's too mature for kids your age." He set the book down, intent on checking it out later. "Why don't I read Peter Cottontail to you instead?"

Sophie huffed but gave in. "Fine."

**...**

After dinner Jamie hid up in his room and opened the book to the first chapter.

_2. The Devil's Mirror_

_Long ago, many years before anyone alive today was born, there was a greater evil than all others. He was called the devil. The devil loved more than anything to torture and hurt humans, taking delight in their terror. One day, he thought up a new way to watch them squirm._

_The devil created a mirror. Anything reflected in the mirror would appear opposite to what it really was. Something beautiful and lovely would appear strange and horrid. Anything ghastly and terrible would appear ordinary and wonderful._

_One day the trolls stole the devil's mirror. They went high up in the clouds to play with it, laughing at the pictures displayed in the mirror. A clumsy troll laughed so hard that he dropped the mirror off the edge of the cloud. Down, down, down it fell, splintering into many pieces. The pieces ranged in size from as large as a window to as small as a grain of sand. The wind picked up the pieces, scattering them everywhere._

_Unhappiness was brought to anyone who had the unfortunate luck to have a splinter of the mirror pierce their eye; that person would never see rightly again. Everything seen would appear terrible and ugly. However, worse was the fate was one whose heart was pierced by a splinter. The person would soon forget the pain and go on as before, never realizing the heart inside them had frozen into ice._

_3. Kai and Gerda_

_Once there was a big city where two children names were Kai and Gerda. They were neighbors and friends. The children often ran across the little garden between their houses to meet each other. In the winter they heat copper coin on the stove, then press them against the window, making peep holes through the frost._

_One day while it was snowing Kai's grandmother said, "See the snow bees flying?"_

_Kai looked out the window. "Snow bees?"_

_"Yes," his grandmother replied. "They have a queen, too."_

_"Really?" Gerda asked._

_"Of course! The Snow Queen. She stays in the middle of the swarm, the largest of them all. She lingers in the dark clouds until midnight, when she flies through the streets of towns and cities, peering through the windows. It's because of her the ice freezes on the windows in wonderful designs and pictures, such as flowers and castles. Have you seen them?"_

_"Yes, we have!" both children said, believing the story._

_"Could the Snow Queen come inside?" Gerda asked._

_"Let her," Kai laughed. "I'll put her on the stove and let her melt."_

_The grandmother told them more tales until it was time for Gerda to go home._

_Late that night Kai awoke, thinking about the Snow Queen. He wondered if he could see her roaming the streets. So he got out of bed and went to the window. to look out the peep hole. Snowflakes were falling, and one seemed larger than the rest. Other snowflakes fell onto it, so the snowflake was growing larger and larger until it turned into a woman dressed in a thick coat. She was very beatiful, yet seemed to be made of ice. Her eyes shined like stars, yet there was no peace or rest in them. The woman turned her head towards the window and waved, as if she could see Kai looking at her._

_The boy jumped away from the window, frightened, and ran back to bed. At the same time it looked as if a bird flew past the window._

_Winter eventually faded into spring and spring soon became summer._

_Kai and Gerda were playing in the garden one day, when Kai suddenly gasped in pain._

_"Something's in my eye," he said, then gasped again. "Something pierced my chest."_

_Gerda looked in his eye but couldn't see anything. Still, she felt sad for him, and started crying._

_"I think it's gone now," he said._

_However, it wasn't. Two shards of the devil's mirror had pierced his his eye and heart. He could no longer see rightly and his heart was frozen. The pain was gone but the shards were not._

_Kai suddenly turned on Gerda. "Why are you crying?" he snapped. "It makes you look ugly. I'm fine, see?" He pulled flowers out of the ground. "These ugly flowers are hideous yet they are more pretty than you!"_

_"What are you doing?" Gerda cried, becoming frightened._

_Seeing this, Kai ripped more out of the ground and jumped through his window, leaving Gerda alone._

_Kai became more cruel over the next few months. He would mock his grandmother and Gerda, and mimic other people. The games he played became less childish and more wicked. He no longer played with his childhood friend. Instead, he played with the older, more mischevious boys._

_Winter was soon upon them again. Kai walked up to Gerda one day and said, "The older boys invited me to play in the square. We're going to race in sleds. And you can't come!"_

_In the square the older boys and Kai fastened their sleds to the country people's carts and pushed them down a large hill. As they went down the hill, the boy realized someone was in the cart pulling his sled. They drove out of town, jumping over hedges and ditches. The snowflakes fell and fell, becoming larger and larger. The driver turned to him. Kai saw the Snow Queen. She pulled him into the cart._

_"Why are you so cold?" she said. "You're trembling."_

_She kissed his forehead. For a moment Kai felt as if he were about to die. Then the cold faded away and he was warm._

_"Still cold," she commented, and kissed him again._

_All of Kai's memories of the city, his grandmother, and Gerda faded away._

_"No more kisses," the Snow Queen said. "Or I'll kill you."_

_The little boy thought the woman was the most beautiful he had ever seen. She seemed smart and wise, so he was not afraid. He didn't notice the cart had turned into a white sled, flying in the air. He didn't notice as they flew over lakes, woods, and rivers, countries, towns, and farms. He didn't care for the bright, full moon over head. Kai told her instead about how he could do arithmetic as she smiled at him._

Jamie skimmed through the next couple chapters. All they were about was Gerda searching for Kai. He wanted to get back to the Snow Queen.

_8. The Snow Queen's Palace_

_The palace was made of snow drift and ice, the windows and doors out of cutting winds. The palace held hundreds of rooms, all appearing as if they were snow blown together. There was nothing amusing in this palace, nothing. Just as it was surrounded by snow made animals it was filled with them too. Otherwise the palace was empty. Vast, empty halls of the Snow Queen's palace._

_One room was a nearly frozen lake. Ths room was her throne room, where she stayed when she was home._

_Kai, blue and frost-bitten, sat at the edge of the lake. He did not feel the cold around him, killing him. He pushed the ice in the water around, making shapes and letters and words. He composed many different kinds, yet he could not form the one word he wanted to the most. 'Eternity'._

_He _-

Jamie looked up out the window for no reason. It was snowing. Jack must be back! He closed the book and opened the window, looking for his guardian friend. Where was he? The snow came down harder. Jamie shivered and took a step back.

"Jack?" he called. "What are you doing?"

Snowflakes flew into his room as outside his window became blocked by the storm. The snowflakes piled on one another, growing larger and larger.

Jamie couldn't help but make the connection between the book and the snow, fear growing inside him. It wasn't, though, right? Jack took care of winter, not -

The snow took the form of a woman with pale skin in a white parka. Her eyes didn't shine like in the book. They were icy blue and angry. The Snow Queen glanced between him and the book lying on his bed. She chuckled.

"Oh, Hans, I remember him," she said, almost sounding happy. "He saw me one day instead of ignoring me like the rest. He listened to what I said, even that one story I told him. I considered taking him away but..." She smiled sweetly at Jamie. "Do you think there's any truth in that story, child?"

"I - I don't know," he answered, backing away.

"I still have those shards. They fell in my lake," she said. "I wonder if they still work...?"

It took the ten year old a moment to figure out what she was talking about. During that moment the Snow Queen seemed to teleport two inches away from. Before Jamie could even stumble backwards, surprised, she pushed something through his shirt, into his chest and poked him in the eye with something sharp. He inhaled sharply, pain pulsing through his body.

The Snow Queen smiled. "Is something wrong, Jamie? You look so cold..."

**...**

**Sorry it's so short, I really wanted to get it out of the way. The real fun starts next chapter. Can anyone guess why the Ice Queen wants Jamie? I bet you can't! ;) (Oh, and I made up the preface myself. Just as a way to possibly get Jamie curious.)**

**_AgentBugs_: Thanks! :D And as for what happens next, you'll see how everything ties together within the next chapter or two. To be honest, I think this story is only gonna be ten to fifteen (maybe) chapters long. So you'll find out soon.**

**_storygirl99210_: We'll see within the next couple chapters. ;)**


	9. A Shocker, Invitation, and Scary Fairy

**It's a fanfiction. Fanfiction is not canon. Fanfiction is made up by fans. That clear? Good. (Gawd, I'm having too much fun making up these lame, now unnessecary disclaimers.)**

**I wanted to get this out fast too because I really, really, really want to get to the next part. Originally that was going to be this one but I decided to stretch it out. So I apologize for if it's not up to anyone's standards. I will try to make the next one better.**

Jack woke up in a red themed bedroom. His staff leaned against the bedpost. Two elves, one wearing a ridiculous, old nurse's hat and the other wearing a plastic stethoscope, were fighting over a toy syringe next to his feet, a toy medical kit at the foot of the bed. Jack rubbed his eye with the back of his head sleepily. "Huh?"

Hearing their 'patient', the elves dropped the toy, jumped off the bed, and ran out of the room, arms flailing wildly.

Why was he in a bedroom? Wasn't he just standing in - Pippa!

Jack hopped out of the covers. He grabbed his staff just as North walked in. The elves glared at him from behind North's legs before running off.

"Jack! You're awake!" he said cheerfully.

The teenager eyed the older man wearily. "Why was I sleeping?"

"Well, after Terra left you must have been feeling disoriented, because you tried to fly out window, only to smack into wall headfirst," he explained, clapping his hands together as if to demonstrate.

Jack raised an eyebrow. "And that knocked me out?"

"No," North said. "Then you stumbled back, tripped over an elf, and hit your head on edge of my table. You fell down, saying something about snowballs, rocks, and princesses. So Sandy put you to sleep. Not the best idea, but you'll live."

_Ouch_. Jack rubbed the back of his head even though it didn't hurt now. "How long was I out?"

"Eighteen or nineteen hours."

"WHAT!" _That long_? He should've been rescuing Pippa in that time! Who knows what Pitch could've done with her by now! "We have to - "

"Now don't go running into anymore walls," the older man said firmly. "The others are already out looking for Pitch's lair. It is no longer in Burgress. If they find anything we'll know. Actually, they should be back anytime now."

Jack couldn't wait that long. He looked around the room before glaring at North. "You put me in a room without any windows on purpose."

He chuckled, eyes twinkling. "Let's go check if the others are back. Then we will go look for Pitch."

Jack wanted to leave NOW. Yet he followed North anyway, knowing there was no point in arguing. (Meaning, he didn't which part of the workshop they were in and would get lost. How did he miss this wing the last time he snuck in? Oh, right, the yetis threw him out.)

"Jack?" North asked as they walked.

"Yeah?" he replied, freezing the ground behind him to keep himself busy instead of flying off.

"I don't know if you know this," he said, "but Mother Nature is not...exactly being self-centered by staying out of this fight."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Jack grumbled, freezing an elf running around. "She's neutral. Still doesn't mean she can't _try_ to save a kid when they're being kidnapped by Pitch."

"She doesn't like getting involved with him," North. "Last time she did didn't end so well."

"What? Did she lose to him or something? She scared of him?" He gave North a questioning look.

"No, no," North said. He suddenly stopped. Jack didn't notice and walked right into his back. "No," North repeated, going again. "She has a personal reason for staying out of it. - Besides last time."

"What happened last time?"

"Not important. Pitch is her father."

Jack stopped abruptly. North turned around to face him. Jack opened his mouth to say something, then shut it again. She was his - his... "WHAT?"

"Pitch - is - her - father," North repeated slower, as if talking to a small child. "Is a lot to hold down, I know. Pitch having a daughter, who happens to be Mother Nature? It is - "

"Who in the right mind who ever - " Jack shuddered, "uh, reproduce - with _him_?"

North frowned. "She was born before he was boogeyman."

"Again - who in the right mind would ever do THAT with Pitch?" he asked seriously before joking with a serious face, "I think I'm gonna throw up."

Well, it did explain why she gave off a familiar vibe. And he thought it was because they both had to do with the seasons! Come to think of it, she did kind of, sort of, just a little bit looked like Pitch. The hair color, facial features... The over-seer of nature was the Nightmare King's daughter. How pleasant. He wondered if Pitch was the over-protective type, like, 'Touch a hair on her head and I'll kill you!' (That would definately explain why she didn't like him.)

"I'm assuming her her mother thought he was a good person at the time," North rolled his eyes.

"Why would he even have kids? He gives them nightmares! Wait, wouldn't he have tried to get her on his side? I mean she's his daughter, and Mother Nature at that!" he asked, walking ahead. (Talking about this or not, he wasn't wasting time to save Pippa.)

"Pitch has no recollection of her at all," North answered, walking with him.

"Really?" Jack pressed his staff against the wall, coating it in ice.

"_I do know what it's like to be cast out, to not be believed in! To long for... a family..."_

"So, he's kind of like how I was?"

"No," North said sternly. "You spent all your years having fun, annoying Bunny, and making the naughty list. Pitch has been trying to fill the world with fear since the beginning."

"So how come he doesn't remember his daughter? Did the Man on the Moon do that?"

They entered a more familiar area of the workshop.

"Not to my knowledge. All I know is that he was once in charge of keeping the fearlings locked up. They escaped and Pitch became Pitch," he finished, scratching his head. "I know there were more details..."

Jack opened the door to the globe room and raised his staff defensively.

Bunny, Tooth, and Sandy were huddled in a circle, weapons out. Surrounding them were a dozen snow wolves (wolves made out of snow) that were growling and snapping their jaws. Bunny threw his boomerang. A wolf caught it in his teeth and bit down, creating a huge crack in it.

Bunny gaped. "My boomerang! Yer gonna pay for that!"

North and Jack rushed in. North had his swords drawn. The teenager wasn't sure how he could fight animals made from his element but he tried not to show it.

One wolf stopped snarling. It walked through the pack towards him and North. It seemed to sense that they were about strike, because it leaped forward and pushed Jack to the ground before he could do anything.

"Jackson Overland Frost," it growled in a deep, gravelly voice.

"These things can talk?" Tooth said.

"You're half-humming bird. This surprises you?" Bunny asked. His eyes darted between Jack and the wolf biting his boomerang (which was now being shaken back and forth furiously, splitting it even more.)

"You are hereby invited to the home of the Ice Queen," the wolf continued to growl.

The other wolves suddenly pounced on the other guardians. Jack blinked at the wolf as they fought the others.

"No thanks," he spat. "I've gotta deal with Pitch. He's got my - "

"Unless you want Jamie Bennet to die, you will arrive on time."

Jack's mouth went dry. That witch had Jamie! She was threatening to kill him if Jack didn't go to her stupid house!? What kind of sick game was she playing? He may love games but this was one he didn't want to play!

"If you do not, the boy known as Jamie Bennet will die," the wolf repeated. "Do you accept the invitation?"

What choice did he have?

"Yes!" he said quickly.

Not even a full second later the wolves dissolved into melted snow. A small, white, velvet box rested on Jack's chest where the wolf's front left paw had been.

"What the bloody 'ell going on!" Bunny demanded. He picked up his broken boomerang angerly.

"Jack, are you all right?" Tooth asked worridly.

What just happened crashed on him. "I've been invited to the Ice Queen's house," he repeated in a dazed fashion. "She has Jamie. She'll kill him if I don't get there on time. What time is it?"

"Kill?" North said, obviously shocked. "As in dead? Not frozen alive or caught in a snow storm?"

"Dead," Jack confirmed. "How am I supposed to save Pippa and Jamie at the same time?"

"What are we, dead weight?" Bunny scowled.

Sandy conjured an image of Jack with Jamie and the rest of the guardians with Pippa.

"We'll find Pitch and your sister while you go after Jamie," Tooth smiled.

"Why would Silvia kidnap Jamie yet tell Jack, someone who would do anything to save him?" North asked. "She wants us seperated. No good."

"Jamie'll die!" Jack shouted. "On the other hand, Pippa's with Pitch! Who knows how she's doing. How either of them are doing." He grabbed his head in his hands. (Was that a headache or a migraine he felt coming on?) "My first believer or my sister. I can't just pick one over other!"

"Pull yourself together, mate!" Bunny scolded. "We haven't found Pitch's lair yet! He's not likely to murder her either. Let's all go get Jamie, get 'im home, and hunt for Pitch's - "

"I DON'T WANNA LEAVE HER WITH HIM!" he roared. "JUST BECAUSE HE WON'T CUT HER THROAT DOESN'T MEAN SHE'S SAFE!"

"_CALM DOWN_!"

Everyone looked at Tooth. Her fists were clenched and her face was red. Uh-oh. Tooth was angry. That was never a good situation. Jack gulped. Bunny, Noth, and Sandy took a step back. "This is exactly what Terra said! If Jack's scared, that increases Pitch's power! Which only puts Pippa and everyone else in more danger! So_**CALM DOWN**_!"

"I haven't seen her this mad in centuries," North commented quietly. Bunny and Sandy nodded. For the first time in his life Jack was actually terrified of the usually bubbly fairy.

Tooth took a deep breath. "North, Sandy, and I will keep looking for them. Jack and Bunny can get Jamie. No one's alone, everyone gets saved."

"My boomerang's busted, though," Bunny said.

She glared at him. "Don't you have spares?"

"Those are in the Warren!"

"Then go there first! Any more questions?" Her eyes darted between the three. No one said anything. "So we're clear on what to do?"

"Yes, ma'am!" North, Bunny, and Jack squeaked as Sandy nodded vigorously. They shrank where they were standing (or sitting).

Tooth smiled bubbly. "Good! Now let's go!" She darted off through the door.

The four males didn't follow. If anything, they shrank even more.

**...**

**I'm sorry if Tooth is ooc, I HAD to put that in! xD**

**Oh, and if anyone can guess the reference I made in, "**You fell down, saying something about snowballs, rocks, and princesses.**" by next chapter (which will probaby be either tomorrow or next week, I don't know, this came quicker than expected, didn't it?) you get a prize! Or not. I don't know, pick something, like I review your story, write a oneshot, blah, blah, blah. Just nothing personal like my address, eh stalkers? ;)**

_**storygirl99210**_**: Yes and no. :)**

_**theHuntress101**_**: Oh, thanks for the lesson. :) And no, Jamie is not Hans or Kai but I like the suggestion. He's supposed to mirror Kai, I suppose.**

_**AgentBugs**_**: It's perfectly fine if you skipped it. Just be glad I was too lazy to write the entire story in! I got lazy and decided to put the important parts in only! And yes, the devil's mirror! Oh, I love your vague guess on why she took Jamie. Let's say it has to do with Jack AND another reason! As for the chapter thing, it'll probably be more than ten now that I think about it, but less than twenty (unless more plot bunnies fall into my head). Thank you!**

_**Guest**_**: O.o Are you some sort of mind reader? That's not entirely it but you got the basics. xD**


	10. Unnecessary Chaos

**Rise of the Guardians is based on a book series that is definately not mine and also belongs to the writer and Dreamworks. I'm not a boy, let alone William Joyce and I don't even work for Dreamworks. Nope, definately not mine. Fanfiction usually means so.**

**I raised the rating to T just to be safe. K+ is a little to low for future chapters.**

**Okay, I wasn't really expecting anyone to get the reference because it is quite vague and I wouldn't be surprised if not that many people knew about it anyway. (That's why it was a challenge.) It was actually based on a real life event, not anything in fiction or RotG. Alright, the last Tsar (or Czar, basically the King) of Russia, Nicholas II, had five children, four older daughters and one younger son. In 1917 the entire family was assasinated. Anyway, the youngest daughter, Anastasia, was said to be the most mischevious of the five (or so I've heard). During one winter she put a rock in a snowball and threw it at her sister during a snowball fight. That's what I was referencing.**

Silvia watched the young boy stared at her empty palace halls in amazement. Obviously the shards of the miror hadn't weakened his curiousity or childish attention span. Watching him, Silvia couldn't help but feel bitterness tightening in her chest. She couldn't wait until this entire episode was over. Maybe she should vent her feelings out by freezing over all of Asia or North America for old times' sake... No.

"Don't wander off too far," she warned the child. "You never know what lies around the corner. It would pain me terribly if you got hurt." (Well, it wasn't a_ complete _lie.)

Jamie - or so she heard his name was - nodded engergetically without turning around to face her. "I won't."

"Even if you get bored in these empty halls?"

"I won't, really! I don't want to make you upset." He turned to face her, letting her see his glazed over, hypnotized eyes.

Her chest tightened even more. She smiled gently. "Good. Thank you."

Silvia turned around curtly, the end of her parka billowing after her. As she walked down the corrider her she tried to shove away her bitterness. Now was not the time for emotion.

Oh, that was laughable, she thought after a moment. Not the time for emotion yet the whole situation was based on emotion. Anger, sadness, desperation, fear, want, lust for revenge - Where exactly did emotion not come into play? It had everything to do with the situation at hand. Her own and others'. Right now she was depending on Jack Frost's own anger and fear (how ironic) to bring him here to save his little believer. She would play on his feelings when he arrived, too. That was what the devil's mirror was for.

Several snow bees buzzed into view from around the corner. How she missed her bees while they gone for all those centuries... At times they were truely her only friends. However, they were minions, not companions, and she treated them as such.

"Oh, news," she said quietly to herself. "Well?"

The bees buzzed their message in a language only Silvia understood.

"I see," she said. "Attacking the guardians in the middle of the invitation was unnecessary. However, it can be easily overlooked. Frost has accepted my invitation, then?"

The bees buzzed, confirming her guess.

She nodded once. "Good. You may go now."

The snow bees swarmed away.

Silvia watched them, then took a step forward and stopped. She gazed at the floor for moment, allowing the bitterness to rise and tighten in her chest. Chuckling, Silvia curled her lip in a sick smile.

"I wonder...what Daniel would say if he saw this. Or Davis, Jean, the twins..."

Picking her head up, she headed to her throne room. That would be the only moment she would let herself dwell on her past life; from here on Silvia was going to be very busy. After all, she would have guests to greet soon.

The Ice Queen didn't hear a voice from behind her whisper sadly, "Oh, Silvie."

**...**

"I can't believe this," Jack said angerly to himself while he waited for Bunny in the Warren.

The rabbit hadn't wanted him anywhere near where he kept his spare boomerangs and stuff; probably didn't trust him in there or even knowing where it was. (Which was probably a smart idea.) But Jack didn't care about that at the moment.

"First she steals my sister's life by taking her away from our parents, then she kidnapps Jamie and threatens to kill him. _Kill_. She'd murder a _kid_... When I get on hands on her..." he trailed off. Jack loosened his grip on his staff; if he gripped it any tighter he might break it.

Jack tried to keep Pippa out of his mind; which was practically impossible. He _really_ hoped the others would get her out of there as soon as possible. The longer she was gone the more danger she could be in.

Attempting to take his mind off of her, he wondered what the box was for. He hadn't opened it yet. Bunny told him not to. Normally he would ignore the rabbit and go right on ahead. Right now though, he had no idea if it was some sort of trap or not. It could blow up his face or send some sort of blizzard (that wouldn't really bother _him_, but he was sure one wouldn't help them at all; well, not right _now_, anyway) for all he knew.

One of Bunny's tunnels opened in the ground. Said rabbit hopped out of it, a new boomerang and his smaller ones filling up his holster completely.

"A'right, mate," he said. "Time to go."

"How are we going to find her realm on time?" Jack asked. "If we're late because we can't find it..."

The 'kangaroo' poked him in the chest with a boomerang, giving Jack a hard look. "Don't even think about it. We'll get 'em back. Usually we're able to find her realm in a matter of days but we don't have for that this time. The witch's palace may always be movin', but there's one person who knows where a wintery realm is at all times."

The teenager gave him an odd look for moment. When he realized who he was talking about his shoulders slumped. Not her. On the other hand, Jamie's life was on the line.

"Let's just make this quick."

Bunny's foot thumped and a hole appeared next to them.

**...**

The storms were just barely kept in the garden. Blizzzards, thunder and lightning storms, tornadoes, earthquakes, even tsunamis roared through the garden, almost utterly destroying it. (The plants definately died.) Imagine if that escaped her realm; her fury would be taken out on the world violently.

At the center of the garden Terra sat, clenching her teeth and hugging her knees. Her appearance changed from her current age to about eleven, five, eighteen, three, seven, fifteen, early twenties, ect. She rarely, if ever, lost control of her emotions. The last time was, oh, maybe a couple thousand years ago? Give or take a few hundred.

Stupid need to vent emotions.

_"You're leaving again?"_

_"I'm sorry, sweetheart. I have to."_

_"But I don't want you to go!"_

_Little Seraphina stamped her foot definately and crossed her arms, as if a temper tantrum could make her daddy stay home._

_Her daddy got on his knees and reached out to hold her. Seraphina dodged his arms._

_"Stay home," she demanded._

_"I can't," he sighed. "I have to make sure the monsters don't get loose again."_

_"Don't care." The little girl sat down on her butt, snatched a random piece of paper along with a red and green crayons from the mess scattered around her room. She slammed the end of the green one against the paper, pushing it back and forth roughly, nearly ripping the paper as she tried to draw a flower instead of paying attention to her daddy. "Don't leave."_

_"You're not even going give me a hug good bye?"_

_"Nope."_

_Seraphina dropped the green crayon and picked up the red crayon. She was half-way trough drawing a circle on top of the stem when her daddy picked her up under her arms._

_"No!" she screamed and struggled as he carried her downstairs and into the kitchen. Her mommy watched them from the kitchen table, playing with a necklace-thing. "NO! No, no, no, no, __**NO**__ - "_

_"Seraphina!"_

_The protests ended, though the pout didn't. Seraphina stuck her bottom lip out definately, glaring, as she was set down on the table._

_"I'll be back soon," he said._

_"Liar," she accused, crossing her arms again. "Never home soon enough."_

_"I know," he sighed again. "It's not that I want to leave - "_

_"'It's that you have to," the little girl quoted in a bored tone. She'd heard it all before. "Why can't someone else do it?" she whined._

_Her mommy muttered something angerly like, 'vol-teer'. Her daddy shot her an exasperated look._

_He turned back to Seraphina. Instead of answering the same question for the thousandth time, her daddy took a necklace-thing from inside his shirt. It was a picture of her from when her parents made her dress up and sit still._

_"I'll still have you with me, and you'll still have me," he said. He nodded to the necklace in her mommy's hands. It had a a picture of him in it. "See?"_

_The little girl wasn't impressed. "I don't want pictures," Seraphina said stubbornly. "I want you hoooome!"_

_"Well, I'm sorry, then," he said, standing up straight. He looked sad. "I'll be home in no time."_

_"Liar," both she and her mommy said at the same time._

_Her daddy rolled his eyes and hugged both of them (though they stood/sat stiffly, still angery at him) before making his way out the door. As soon as the door shut her mommy started crying. Seraphina stared at the door, thinking of how she would throw a real tantrum next time he tried to leave home._

_Unfortunately, he never came home again in the first place._

**...**

"AAAHHHH!"

Jack narrowly avoided being struck by lightning. Bunny had been swept away by the strong winds. Seriously, those had to be going over a hundred miles per hour! Miraculously, Jack had avoided it by staying in the blizzardy area (not even five feet from where the rabbit had been previously standing), where the winds were more mild.

Somehow, he hadn't imagined Mother Nature's home to be like this. Seriously, how could anyone_ live _here?

Hail literally the size of snowballs suddenly rained down. Several hit Jack on the head, forcing him to sheild it with his arms. They were hard as rocks. "Ow!"

Lightning struck a nearby tree. Blackened, a particularly large branch broke off

Jack couldn't hear the loud _snap_ over the rushing winds, thunder, and blood pounding in his ears. He did see, however, the growing shadow surrounding him. He looked up, saw the branch a several feet above his head, and jumped away. Balls of hail flew directly into his right side and ribcage before he could land safely on the ground. Jack lost what little footing he had and fell flat on his face. The ground beneath him began shaking violently.

Okay, really?

Jack struggled to feet.

"Wind!"

The wind picked up around him. The teenager was lifted from the ground. He breathed out in relief. At least the wind was still on his s-

Nevermind.

The wind picked up speed twice as fast, knocking Jack off guard. He hurtled through the air, screaming, as he was thrown into a tornado. Several objects smashed into Jack. He was positive half those objects were thorny plants. At one point he saw Bunny in the tornado; he was being tossed around, covering his mouth protectively, until he was thrown out of sight.

Then, suddenly, everything stopped. The lightning quit striking, the thunder stopped pounding, the ground wasn't trembling anymore, and every trace of the blizzard disappeared. Even the wind went away, which meant the tornado did, too.

Again, Jack fell flat on the ground. He groaned and waited until the sound of falling objects stopped to raise his head.

To find Terra glaring at him, arms crossed.

"What are you doing here?" she snapped.

Jack sat up. The thorns had cut up his feet and left cheek and his torso was sore, but otherwise he was fine. "What am I - ? What was THAT all about?" He spread out his arms, gesturing to the large mess of land. "And where's Bunny at?"

Terra pointed her middle and forefinger to the left. Bunny was attempting to pull his head out of the ground.

Despite himself, the teenager laughed.

Terra snapped her fingers. The ground shook once again. It split where the unfornate bunny was, letting him pull his head out. Another snap closed the crevice.

"Now what do you two want?" she demanded again.

Bunny stumbled over to them dizzily, holding his head in his paws as Jack told her the story. "I think I lost my lunch somewhere," he muttered.

The girl wrinkled her nose in disgust. "Ew. Did you lose the box during the storms?"

Jack hadn't thought of that. He hurridly dug into his hoodie pocket and pulled it out. Phew.

"That's your gateway to her realm," Terra explained. "Since her realm is no longer a part of this world and in Spitsbergen, that's the only way to get into her realm quickly. Unless you're with her yourself. Honestly, I'm not sure how it works myself."

"Really?" Jack asked. "I would'a thought you did." He glanced at Bunny, who was still a bit disoriented.

"I've never been invited to her realm after she lost her powers, nor have I ever WANTED to go there," Terra said. She sighed as if she was extremely annoyed. "Alright, this is partly my fault. So, I suppose I can help out a little more."

Storm clouds gathered in the sky.

"I'll help find the location of the enterance to Black's realm and show the other guardians," she explained. "Also, get out of my realm. I don't want any portals to _her_ place in my garden."

The wind pulled the three of three into the clouds. The next thing Jack knew, he and Bunny were falling out of the sky over a city. They landed in the middle of a street, cars driving right through them.

A couple of kids on the sidewalk yelled things in a different language that roughly translated to:

"There's a giant rabbit in the road!"

"He has white hair!"

"I saw him last winter!"

"Get out of the road before a car hits you!"

Jack smiled weakly and waved at them, trying to signal they were okay. Bunny grabbed him by the hood, opened one of his tunnels, and dragged him down it. They re-surfaced in an almost empty park. The only people Jack could see was an old couple sitting on a bench a few dozen yards away.

"Alright, no one's around and nothin's running through us every other second," Bunny said. "I missed half of what Terra said while gathering my wits. Mind telling me what the box is for?"

"It's a gate to her realm," Jack said. "She didn't really know how it works, though."

The 'kangaroo' raised an eyebrow. "That thing's small enough to hold a piece of jewelry only; how're we supposed to use it as a gate?"

"I dunno," he answered, holding it up. "Maybe what's inside is the gate? Or leads to it?"

"Maybe. Open it up, then."

Jack lifted the lid. A blizzard of snow jumped out of the box, enveloping both guardians. They could barely see anything but white flurries.

"FROST!" Bunny roared over the wind.

"IT'S NOT ME!" Jack screamed back.

He squinted his eyes, looking in every direction. There had to be something around here somewhere! He swung his staff, trying to clear the storm away. It didn't work. The blizzard continued.

"This is not your domain," a young-sounding male voice said in Jack's ear. "You may be able to control winter elements but you're in Silvie's world now. Find the outline of her palace and you find your way out of the storm. But be prepared for Silvie's wrath."

"WHAT?" he yelled. "WHO'S THERE?"

"WHAT?" Bunny yelled back, thinking Jack was talking to him.

Outline of her palace. Right. As if it were possible to see anything out here. Jack took a step forward, then another.

"You have to look for it," the voice came back. "If you don't you'll be trapped here. Just concentrate on finding it."

"This is annoying," Jack mumbled to himself.

"Hey, who said it wouldn't be? I mean, you're practically in a lose-lose situation."

"'Lose-lose'?" Jack repeated.

The voice didn't answer.

Jack searched for an outline in the snow that looked like a palace. All he managed to find was Bunny. He wondered around for what seemed like both hours and seconds (how was that possible?), shouting out every now and then to make sure Bunny was still close by.

"WE GOTTA GET OUTTA HERE!" Bunny shouted back at one point. "WE AREN'T GOING TO FIND IT HERE. YOU MAY BE OKAY BUT I'M FREEZING MY TAIL OFF!"

"ANY IDEAS ON HOW WE LEAVE?" Jack shouted back once he realized the box had vanished. "I DROPPED THE BOX SOMEWHERE!"

"FROSTBITE!"

"LIKE I WAS TRYING TO LOSE IT!"

Jack tried again to force the storm to calm down. Again, it didn't work.

"Hey, weird voice," he called, not really expecting an answer. "Any more great advice?"

"Yes," the voice said, just as sarcastic as Jack had been. "You're an idiot. Try telling you're friend to look for a PALACE. He's blind as a bat and looking for a gate. He doesn't listen to _me_. Thinks I'm just one of Silvie's tricks. Blocking me out."

By Silvie, Jack assumsed it meant the Ice Queen.

"How do I know you're not a trick?" he asked. "Bunny has a point."

"You know," the voice said snidely, "Silvie's not that patient. It'd be shame if that poor kid died because you're acting stupid. Look, I'm on you're side. Now hurry it up! Silvie's losing her patience and her temper."

What other choice did he have to go with? Jack tried for a third time to stop the blizzard. When that failed again, he yelled, "BUNNY! I THINK THIS IS HER REALM! LOOK FOR HER PALACE!"

"NO!" came his sarcastic response. "I THOUGHT WE WERE IN THE WARREN!"

"WHAT?"

Whatever Bunny thought he heard, Jack thought he saw a large object in the distance. He squinted, walking forward. As he did the shape became more clear. It looked like a castle made out of glass.

"DO YOU SEE that?" Bunny asked, coming closer. The wind died down more and more as they advanced.

"Yeah," Jack replied. "This it?"

He nodded. "Silvia has a lot of tricks, Jack. I don't know what her game is, but she'll probably try to get in your head."

"Get in my head?" He gave Bunnny an odd look. Not because he didn't believe it. It was just that he expected a real fight, not mind games.

"Yup. She's not into physical fighting, which puts her at a disadvantage. Somewhere along the way, I guess, she picked up some tricks to mess with yer mind. She'll try illusions, sweet talking, setting traps, ect. All meant to distract you and that's when she goes in for the kill."

They came upon a bridge. The two didn't stop walking.

"Like what?" Jack asked. "What did she do the other times you came here?"

Bunny hesitated. "She...brought back some terrible memories for me," he vaguely answered. "You just have to remind yourself of the situation, remember it's not real if you can."

"Why can I already tell this won't be fun?" Jack wondered aloud.

Bunny didn't respond. He just went ahead faster.

"Trust me," the voice suddenly spoke up again. "Silvie's got a few traps hanging around. You're in for a real joy ride."

"Who are you?" the teenager asked.

"Huh? Oh, you mean my name. It's Daniel."

Jack glanced around. "Why can't I see you?"

"It's difficult to explain. It sort of, kind of, not really, but somewhat like why those kids could hear yet couldn't see your sister."

"Did the Ice Queen take you?"

Daniel didn't reply.

"Are you coming or not, Frostbite?" Bunny yelled. He was already at the door.

Jack ran the rest of the way across the bridge. He was about to ask how they got in when the large doors opened, revealing a shiny, white, empty entrance hall.

**...**

_"My baby!" her mother cried, covering her tear-streaked face._

_Her father put an arm around her mother, glaring at his daughter._

_"It's your fault I'm dead," her brother's voice rang out._

_Pippa lowered her head in grief. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to get stuck on thin ice."_

_"Jackson! - He's gone!" her mother hiccuped._

_Her father continued to glare._

_"Everyone's upset that you killed me," Jack's voice echoed cruelly._

_Pippa's head snapped up. "I did not! I didn't want you to die!"_

_"So why did go out on thin ice?"_

_"I didn't know it would crack!" she cried._

_"You're my little sister - I played tricks and jokes on you, yeah. But I still loved you." Jack appeared in front of their parents, looking just as he did the morning before he died. Except instead of laughing and teasing her for her excitement, he was scowling. "And you got me killed. I drowned, I froze to death. Because. Of. You."_

_"No!" she cried._

_"It's all your fault. You think I'll save from the boogieman after that? No thanks, you deserve to rot."_

_"Jack! Stop being so mean! I know it's my fault! But I didn't mean it really!"_

_Jack's lip curled in disgust. "And you're a liar at that. You admit it was your fault and still say it was an accident. Honestly, how do you live with yourself!"_

_"My poor baby...!"_

_"..."_

_"I'm sorry! I'm really sorry!"_

_Pippa's brother shook his head in disbelief. "Yeah, right." He disappeared, leaving her alone with their parents._

_"Jackson... No... Why weren't you more careful!" her mother shrieked. "This is your fault!"_

_"He's dead because of you," her father agreed._

_Pippa's whole world fell apart._

Pitch chuckled at the little girl's nightmare. This was too rich! Not only that, his power was returning. With the strength he had he gave hundreds of other children nightmares, increasing his power even more! It wouldn't be long now before he could go against of the guardians one more time.

For the final time.

**...**

**Again, I cut the chapter short. I really want to get to the next part but then I decide to put it in the next chapter after the current one. Which makes it a longer wait to see how certain things connect. I can say, though, that the next chapter is when Silvia's backstory comes into play and readers will find out just who Daniel (and the others Silvia mentioned) is. I'm hoping to get it out before/by Tuesday but I can't promise I will!**

_**storygirl99210**_**: Yes, she can. :) We'll get to that later.**

_**AgentBugs**_**: Thanks! And yeah, I didn't think anyone would really get it, as stated above. Yes, she was. :p**

_**Immortal Bubblewrap**_**: Thank you! :D Yeah, you're right about getting irritated. I just wasn't sure her being that angery was in character. Haha, sorry I made it that hard.**


	11. The Ice Queen's Domain

**Again, I'm so sorry for the delay. Feel free to throw knives. /Hides in cupbaord./ You know, in this chapter, I end up tortuing two my favorite characters and seem to make one more pathetic than he really is, which is annoying. Oh well. By the way, if you're a hard-core Jack Frost fan with a kind of soft stomach - well, you won't like the near end of this chapter. It's not that bad in my opinion, but I thought I'd warn ya.**

**Also, I know I said I would put the Ice Queen's backstory in this chapter, but, as I was writing it, I realized the document was getting really long. I checked the word count and it was almost 8,000 words for one unfinished chapter alone! So I cut it down and the story will be next chapter, which is also when we'll get back to the others. So this might end on a confusing note.**

_When leaves have fallen and skies turn to grey  
__The night keeps on closing in on the day  
__A nightingale sings his song of farewell  
__You better hide from her freezing hell  
__On cold wings, she's coming  
__You better keep moving  
__For warmth, you'll be longing  
__Come on  
__Just feel it  
__Don't you see it?  
__You better believe  
__When she embraces your heart turns to stone  
__She comes at night when you're all alone  
__And when she whispers  
__Your blood shall run cold  
__You better hide before she finds you  
__Whenever she is raging  
__She takes a life away..._

- Within Temptation, 'Ice Queen'.

**...**

Not ten seconds. Not ten are they inside the Ice Queen's palace when the doors behind them slam shut and all sorts snow/ice-made animals (bears, wolves, snakes) appear out of nowhere suddenly, ready to attack, snarling and hissing, from all directions. What a wonderful way to greet guests you invited. _Not_.

"We defend our queen to the last," one wolf growled in similar voice to the one that had 'invited' Jack earlier.

Jack swung his staff partly in attempt to fight the creatures, partly to make sure he could still use its powers. It worked just as well as it had outside; not at all. He backed up towards Bunny. How was he supposed to fight these things? He had a feeling blunt force wouldn't work, considering his friend's boomerangs hardly scratched the creatures and his explosive eggs only colored them.

"What're you doing?" Bunny snapped, catching his weapon when it flung back.

"My staff isn't working," Jack said. He eyed the advancing snakes wearily.

"_What_? How in bloody - "

A wolf pounced on the rabbit's chest, knocking him to the ground. He kicked it away with his hind legs just before it could bite his face off. Throwing two boomerangs at it, he stood and faced Jack, who was nimbly dancing around to avoid the half a dozen snakes and three bears aiming for him.

"What do ya mean it isn't working?" he yelled.

Jack leaned back to dodge the claw about to scratch his face. "I mean it's not working!" He swiped the staff across the ground, trying to force back the snakes, then jumped away as one lunged to bite his foot. "Watch out!" he called after glancing up for a quick second.

Bunny heard roaring from behind him. Whirling around, he saw a bear raise its claws about a foot away. The rabbit hopped to the side and grabbed another boomerang from his holster. A wolf lunged from behind, digging its claws into the Easter Bunny's back. He shrieked in pain, an icy pain tearing through his spine as he fell to the ground.

Jack jumped, raised his staff, and struck at the wolf. It yiped, losing its grip and skidding a few meters away. It recovered quickly, curling its lip and growling. Jack looked his friend, who was struggling to get up. A large area around where the wolf had scratched had turned black. Frostbite.

"Bunny..." he gasped.

"I'm fine," his friend snapped. Jack noticed his teeth were chattering. "Just...numb."

Had he been an ordinary rabbit, Bunny probably would have been paralyzed. Most of his back, spine included, were frostbitten to the second degree. However, he was an immortal warrior, not an ordinary rabbit, so he was able to stagger upright.

"You gonna be all right?" the teenager asked worridly.

"Of course," he scoffed, tossing another weapon at a wolf, watching the creature flip over on its back, and catching it again. "But we're at a huge disadvantage here. You can't use yer powers, my boomerangs and eggsd aint doing the trick, and at least I'm able to be frostbitten by a single injury. We gotta get out of here, mate."

Jack stuck a bear, retreating backwards. "We're not leaving Jamie!"

"I didn't say we were." Bunny eyed the two curving staircases that lead to an indoor balcony. "Up there!"

Jack looked between the staircases and the creatures closing in on the two. "'Kay!"

He jumped up, kicked the head of one bear, and landed a few feet behind it, just missing the bite the animal almost gave his foot. Bunny staggered a moment (his numb spine was resisting), then threw boomerang after boomerang at the wolves and snakes closest to him. When he was sure they were momentarily stunned, he bolted. Both guardians ran up seperate stairs. At the top Jack looked back to see how close behind the creatures were.

"Look!" he told Bunny in amazement.

The animals were gradually melting into piles of snow and puddles of water as they advanced forward. Weird. So much for 'defending their queen to the last'.

"Don't think this is over," the same wolf (Jack assumed) growled, as if reading his thoughts.

'Creepy,' he thought.

A pang of hopelessness suddenly pierced through Jack. He couldn't fight, just dodge and hit. Bunny got injured and all he could do was push the wolf away. Had he been able to use his powers, he could've froze the creature before it hit his friend at all. He was useless...

Bunny peered at Jack suspiciously. The brat's head hung, staring at the floor forlonely. He stood up straight, forcing his stiffened back to make a cracking noise. The boy's head snapped up to look at him.

"Don't let this place get to you, mate," he told him.

Jack sighed and placed his staff behind his neck, grasping it with both hands. "You don't get it." He shook his head. "My powers are practicaly gone and you got injured. I'm useless. If I can't fight - "

"Now stop right there," Bunny interrupted firmly. "I already told ya I'm fine. I'm not fragile, in case you haven't noticed. Look, not being able to use your element is probably the witch's doing, and most of the guilt your feeling. I told you she messes with your head, didn't I? Besides, if wasn't for you that demon probably would've bitten my neck before I got 'im off of me. You aren't useless. So get over it."

"He's right," Daniel whispered in Jack's ear. "Silvie's rusty. She isn't able to mess with your emotions too much yet. Snap out of it, Jacky-boy. The longer you let her get to you the more control she has to manipulate you."

A haze filled Jack's mind.

_Useless, useless, useless. Can't save his friends, can't save his sister. Useless, useless, useless. Why not give... '_No, I don't want to.' _How could he possibly expect to save Jamie, then his baby sister if he can't fight? If the kangaroo is injured? Useless, useless, useless ~ _'Shut up.' _What kind of guardian can't figh-_

SMACK!

"Ow!" Jack rubbed his sore cheek. All insecure thoughts quickly evaporated from his mind. He scowled at the Easter Kangaroo. "What was that for?!"

It was momentarily obvious that Bunny was trying to conceal his smirk. "Ya snapped out of it, didn't you?"

The haze was gone. Okay it _had_ worked. That still didn't mean Jack wanted to be literally slapped out of the Ice Queen's control. He chose not to respond (when he got his powers back he would freeze his precious Easter eggs, he thought idly). Instead, he walked towards one of the corridors the balcony lead into. Bunny caught up.

"Just remember her tricks aren't real. I know it's hard to tell what's a trick and what's not, but if you don't figure it out quickly, she'll get you under her thumb. Trust me, that's not where you want to be," he explained.

"It still had a point," he mumbled. "What if we're too late? What if Jamie - or Pippa - "

"Just don't think about that," his rival advised. "Not here, anyway," he added under his breath, though Jack heard him anyway.

"I can't do much except dodge attacks," the older Frost continued. "And if you get bitten or scratched enough by her hell hounds and other animals you'll be completely frostbitten. If that happens, the kids'll -"

"Didn't I say to knock that off," Bunny asked harshly. "Don't think about that kind stuff here, don't talk about that kind of stuff here. You'll just give Silvia more ideas. If you do that, _then_ your worries will come true."

"How do you know?" Jack asked, hunching his shoulders and shoving a hand in his hoodie pocket.

"You know how many kids she kidnapped after losing her winter powers?"

"No."

"Over four hundred. And every time she used mind games to try and get rid of us. The witch listens to everything that goes on in this palace, whether she hears it herself or uses her little spies," the over-sized rabbit explained as they turned a random corner. "She might even create an illusion, make you think its real, and get more information out of ya that way. Then she'll use that against you."

"Like?"

Without thinking too much about it, the teenager looked around. He had to admit - for such a dangerous, desolate place, the palace was stunning in its own right. He could tell it was made purely out of ice, snow, and every now and then he thought he felt a cold breeze (though he couldn't tell if the wind was real or not). A flawless design shaped into an entire realm - he wondered if he could make something like this (not that he'd live in it). As they walked he noticed murials were carved into certain areas of the walls - pictures of castles, children, monsters, animals - you name it. Some seemed to tell stories.

"Well," Bunny scratched behind one ear. "Say, Sophie for example - we could be talking about her. The witch would hear us. Even though we KNOW Sophie's not 'ere, she'd make a mirage of the little ankle-biter and use her magic to force us to believe it's real. The fake Sophie could then get us into revealing enough information for Silvia to use against us."

"Right," he muttered, still examining the pictures as they turned a corner. "Hey, do you have any idea where we're going?"

"Nope. We've tried, it's impossible to map this place, even using mark- "

One murial made Jack stop. Bunny raised an eyebrow and looked.

Carved into the wall was a picture of two children, a boy and a girl, walking up a hill. As Jack stared as the picture morphed into a similar yet different scene.

The boy was taller, carrying a hooked staff. He seemed to be talking or laughing, walking up the hill backwards. The girl skipped after him. At the top of the hill was what looked like a well, an old one with a bucket hanging by a rope.

Jack turned to the next section of the murial. Once the two got to the top the boy lost his footing. He slipped, sumersaulting down the hill.

The third depicted the boy lying at the bottom of the hill. Stars circled his head, making it seem like a comical scene. The boy's torso was darker and the top of his head lighter, this being shown through the shadows the nonexistent lights in the hall were casting. The girl, meanwhile, tumbled down after him.

The last section of the story showed the boy flying in mid-air away, laughing, while the girl crashed into a frozen (shown through the fact pieces of the surface sunk after her) body of water that hadn't been in the other scenes.

_Jack and Jill went up the hill to fetch a pale of water. Jack fell down and broke his crown. And Jill came tumbling after._

Jack made the connection easily. He ground his teeth angerly. "She's making fun of my death."

"Death?" Bunny gave him a peculiar look. "How? It's just a nursey rhyme. You didn't fall down a hill while fetching water with a girl named Jill, did ya?"

Jack's neck snapped towards the large rabbit. "Don't you see it? The staff, the wat- " He looked back at the murials. They told the orginal story now. Not a mockery of Jack's death. The part with the girl falling in the water stayed in his mind. Had his sister fallen in after him? No, she was too far away - unless she jumped in after him. No, she couldn't have. Even in shock she... "Pippa..."

"Eh?"

"_Ggggrrrrrwww_..."

The two guardians spun around. More wolves. Dozens of them literally rising from the icy floor. Yay.

The teen raised his staff defensively while his rival reached for his boomerangs. This fight wasn't going to be easy, that was for sure.

"Now, now," a soft, gentle voice sounded. "That is no way to treat guests."

A gust of wind and snow slammed through the wall. Jack's vision blurred. He cold hear the wind roaring in his ears. It, surprisingly enough, reminded him buzzing bees. He backed himself against the wall, covering his face from the stinging snow (when was the last time he had to do that?). He stayed there for what felt like hours, unable to move, before he heard something above the wind and buzzing.

"Silvia!" he heard Bunny shout.

"Yes, E. Aster Bunnymund? Is there something you - **AAAHHH**_AHHHH_!"

The snow evaporated quickly. Jack cocked his head in surprise. The wolves seemed to have lost interest in him and Bunny entirely. They retreated down the hallway in an almost bored fashion. One was throwing its head back and forth wildly, a boomerang between his teeth.

"Wh-what?" he said. "Why are they leaving?"

"That was too easy," Bunny muttered apprehensively. "I know I hit her. I heard her scream. But it couldn't have hurt her THAT badly. Yet at the last second she sounded just like a ch- " he stopped immediately, eyes widening in panic. He sunk to his knees, letting the one boomerang he was holding fall out of his grasp.

Jack saw something like fog envelope his friend's body. Out of instict he backed away.

One of the last wolves noticed Bunny. It tilted its head curiously, then gave him a nip on the arm. The wound blackened instantly, and spread up to his elbow. Interested, the creature leaned forward for another bite, baring its teeth. Jack reeled his staff back and smacked the wolf away. It yiped, running further ahead of the pack instead of attacking. What the heck was going on now?

Across the hall (only a couple feet away) a lump of snow lay. A mark ran through it. The teen guessed that was where Bunny's boomerang had struck. Somehow, the lump was slowly melting.

"I do apologize," the feminine voice rang out. "Only those affected by the mist may see what he is seeing."

Jack looked in the direction where the wolves were heading.

A young woman - maybe a couple years older than Jack in appearance - stood not far away. She was tall, maybe almost as tall as Pitch. Her skin was a pale, almost blue color, and her hair was white. A parka covered her body, the hood down, giving Jack a more clear view of her pretty face. What stood out most about her herself were her light blue eyes. Even from a distance they popped out, calm yet threatening, sort of like the calm before the storm. This had to be the Ice Queen.

Beside her interested Jack more. It was Jamie. He was shivering violently. His skin and clothes had frosted over, and lips had turned a purple-ish blue color. He was literally freezing to death from the cold. The worst part was he didn't seem to know it. He just stood close to the Ice Queen, not even trying to warm himself by rubbing his arms, hands, anything. Instead the kid silently glaring at Jack as if he were scum.

Jamie would never glare at Jack like that. Was this one of the Ice Queen's tricks? Then again, what would a glaring Jamie gain her? All it really did was make the white haired boy suspect the boy he was seeing wasn't the real Jamie. However, fake or not, Jack couldn't deny that the boy was suffering from hypothermia. If it really was Jamie, he wasn't going to last much longer here. They had to get him home - fast.

"S-Sophie...?" Bunny choked.

"What?" Jack tore his eyes away from his first believer to gawk at his rival.

The ten year old looked up at the woman, confused. "Sophie? My sister?"

"Hush, child," she responded. "Yes, he thinks that mound of snow is Sophie Bennet. My spell was meant to lead him to believe he broke the child's neck with that infernal boomerang of his."

Jamie kicked the ground stubbornly. "I wish it were Sophie," he muttered.

_WHAT?_

Jack stared at the two in horror. "A-Are you kidding me? You've GOT TO BE KIDDING ME! _WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU PLAYING AT?_"

The ten year old shook his head as if the older boy were an idiot. The Ice Queen smiled sweetly.

"Playing?" she repeated calmly. "Oh no, Jackson. I'm not playing. In fact, I believe 'playing' falls under you're forte. I don't 'play'. I haven't in many years."

She flicked her wrist, as if shooing him away.

Jack, purely on impulse, looked up. Had the ceiling been covered in massive icicles before? He looked back at the Ice Queen, perplexed. "What's that supposed to do, scare me? I'm not afraid of a few icicles, lady."

Silvia made a noise that sounded like she were trying not to laugh. "May I remind you, Jackson, that you are in the domain of a powerful winter witch, cut-off from the outside world? That here, not even a winter spirit such as yourself has any power?"

The hall started shaking so violently the teenager lost his footing and slid, slamming into the wall. The massive icicles fell. Several surrounded Bunny like cage. Jamie clung to the Ice Queen, who watched coldly, flicking her wrist again. Several icicles switched direction, heading towards the wall instead of the ground. Four ripped through Jack's hoodie, barely avoiding cutting his flesh, one on either of his sides and sleeves. He was pinned to the wall.

"Had this palace been under anyone else's control, I'd be willing to bet this situation would have little to no effect," she said, smile gone.

Jamie let go of her parka. He broke out laughing.

"As you can see," the Ice Queen told him, "the child isn't acting like himself. I'll admit, that is my fault."

"Yeah, I got that." Jack tried to pull his arms toward him. If he could get his arms out of his sleeves, he could worm his way out of his hoodie, therefore free from the wall. "What did you do - Hey!" His arms went completely numb. Not tingling like pins and needles. He couldn't feel them at all, let alone move them. If he didn't know any better he'd think they were seperated from his torso.

Jamie tilted his head curiously. "Huh?"

"His arm muscles are frozen," Silvia explained. "I'm not stupid. You are lucky I didn't pierce your limbs to keep you in place."

"Oh." The kid laughed again.

It made Jack want to throw up.

"As I was saying," the Ice Queen continued, "the boy's change of heart is my fault. If I explain myself, will you listen? Or should I skip - "

"Just get on with it," Jack interrupted irratably. "What did you do to Jamie?"

"If I remember correctly, you died via drowning in icy water in the early eighteenth century. Am I right?" she asked.

"What does that have to do with anything?"

"Just answer."

He sighed. Not like he had any better ideas on what to do. "Yeah, 1712, or something around that time."

"In present day Burgess?"

"Around there."

"And that is in New England?"

"Yeah. What does this have to do with Jamie again?"

"I don't suppose the little colony boy ever learned how to read, did he?" she asked smugly.

"Ooo, a stab at my education. That hurts. Hey, you're really, really, really old. Did you?" he shot back.

"I don't suppose you ever stopped to read anything after becoming Jack Frost, either."

"Well, considerin' us colony boys don' know how to read..."

"I didn't think so," she replied curtly. "There is a fairy tale called 'The Snow Queen'."

"You must be so - "

"Stop interrupting before an icicle castrates you," Silvia threatened.

Jack shut his mouth. He folded his legs indian-style.

"What's that mean?" Jamie asked curiously.

"Hush, child. The beginning of the fairy tale tells of a magic mirror that distorts whatever it is reflecting."

"Why can't I know what it means?" Jamie whined. "It sounds like it hurts."

Silvia glanced strangely down at him. "Jamie, please."

"Sorry."

"Once upon a time, Jackson," she continued, walking up to Jack's side. She ripped his staff out of his grip. "There was a mirror that disorted the image of whatever it reflected." She threw the staff across the floor. "Anything beautiful, anyone intelligent, any sneaky creature would appear hideous, stupid, and obvious. The vice-versa was also true.

"The fairy tale states that this mirror was created by the devil as a new way to mock humans. It states that one day trolls accidently shattered it. Both are lies I made up to satisfy the author's curiousity. Not even I know the mirror's origins or how it broke. What is definate, however, was that if one was pierced by a shard the person would change. If pierced in the eye, the poor fool would see everything just as the mirror reflected it. If pierced in the heart, the poor fool would forget the pain and go on as before, the heart inside him or her frozen. Whether this is literal or metaphorical, I do not know.

"One day I stole away a child who had pierced in both his eye and heart. It was shortly before you would have been born. I didn't know at the time he had been peirced by the mirror. In fact, I didn't realize it until he managed to escape. In my throne room is a lake.

"Now, let me remind you that I created every inch of this fortress. There is not a single area in this vast, nearly empty castle that I do not know of. Every object inside belongs to me. I've lived here for thousands upon thousands of years. I know it well.

"When I returned to my lake where I left the child, I discovered he was gone. Later I would find him home, all grown up. The shards of the mirror were no longer a part of his heart nor his eye. Where do you think they were? In my throne room, of course. When I noticed two little shines on the shore I did not recognize them as my own creations. Curious as to what broken glass was doing in my home, I stored them away until I found out."

She reached for the boy's chin, forcing him to look directly at her. Silvia smirked.

"When I realized what they were and how they got there, I knew I could use them to my advantage. Now think, and try not to strain yourself, colony boy - what in the world could that possibly have to do with the wild behavior changes in your little friend?"

Jack glowered at her. He got it alright.

With zero power, zero resistance to the Ice Queen's share of winter elements, no staff, and frozen arm muscles while pinned to a wall, he did the first thing that he could that popped in his head. He spat in her face.

The Ice Queen snatched her hand back and quickly recoiled. She wiped the spit off her cheek in disgust. Her face was livid with anger, eyes flashing dangerously.

"Why you little - How dare you - !"

"How do you get rid of the shards?" he demanded.

"As if I would tell you!" She turned to the hypnotized rabbit staring at the still-melting snow. She smiled deviously. "Aster..." she cooed.

"Hey!" Jack barked. "I'm not done yet!"

"Look at what you have done," she cooed to the hypnotized bunny. "You _killed_ a child."

"I - I didn't mean to. No! I didn't!" he said as if in a trance.

"Are the guardians not meant to protect children? Even the horrible boogeyman doesn't go as far as to physically _slaughter_ one..."

"I - I didn't!"

"Are you not ashamed?" the Ice Queen pressed.

"Knock it off!" Jack shouted, flailing around uselessly.

"Unfit! A child murderer has no place amongst the guardians!" she scolded, smirking.

"I wasn't aiming for her!" Jack could see the bunny's eyes water.

"You deny it! How can you deny it! How could you ever go on living as a guardian of childhood when _you snapped one's neck_!"

Jack was about to shout again when Jamie walked up to him. The not-himself kid smiled innocently at him as the witch continued to verbally assault his confused friend loudly. He cupped on hand over his mouth so the others wouldn't hear.

"Wanna know a secret?" he whispered.

"I don't think I do," Jack replied, dreading whatever the mirror splinters would make the ten year old say.

Jamie took a step closer, pushing himself up on his tippy-toes. "I don't believe in you."

It was the mirror's influence, it was the mirror's influence, it was the mirror's influence, not Jamie. It was the mirror's influence, it was the mirror's influence, not Jamie. They wouldn't be having this conversation if he didn't believe. The real Jamie believed. It was the mirrors influence. It was the mirrors influence. It was the mirrors influence. It was the mirrors influence...

He tried to convince himself of this, despite the sinking feeling in his stomach and tightening chest. His visage must have displayed this, or the mirror was just making the kid that cruel, because he broke out giggling insanely, clutching his sides.

Silvia turned back to him. She smirked, walking back up to Jack's side. The older woman stroked his cheek affectionately. "Oh, Jack. You look so cold. You must warm up or you'll catch your death." She leaned forward and kissed his forehead.

At first Jack felt like he was going to die right then and there, right in front of the Jamie. (The mirror would probably make the boy laugh instead of scaring him for life.) Then the feeling subsided and a warm feeling spread across his body, even into his arms. Jack didn't like it. It was too warm for him, like wearing winter clothing under a thick, winter coat on a hot summer day in the nineties. The feeling was dreadful.

"You looked pained!" The Ice Queen faked astonishment. "I'll fix that."

She kissed his forehead again.

This time Jack felt drained. His head became foggy and he couldn't think straight. What was Bunny doing on the floor? Why was he here again? Who was the kid and lady standing near him? Whoa! There was a giant rabbit! Are rabbits supposed to get that big or was it a stuffed animal? What was his own name again? It started with a 'J', right? Come to think of it, was he a boy or girl? He couldn't remember even that. He did know he liked snowball fights and messing around. Those were nice pass times.

Jack's wonderful thoughts of snow and annoying people were abruptly cut short by a sharp pain ripping through his torso. His head jerked forward. Blood flooded his mouth. He was barely able to keep from spitting it out, a small amount trickling through his lips, down his chin. He breathed erratically through his nose, eyes wide. From mid-back down he couldn't feel his body parts.

Trembling, he turned his gaze downwards.

And broke out screaming a blood-curdling scream, letting all the blood in his mouth pour out on his hoodie.

An iccicle about four feet in length and about six inches in circumference in the largest part was pertruding from of his stomach. It had shot out from the wall behind him. It was covered in blood, especially the soaked tip, which was dripping onto the pristine, white ground.

For a split second Jamie's face twisted, displaying absolute horror. Paler than before, he appeared as if he would vomit all over the floor. That was when the mirror splinters in his eye and heart took effect. He laughed even harder than every time before.

"Poor little Jackson," Silvia whispered in his ear, her breath icy instead of warm. "You're immortal. You can't die. Another kiss would not take full effect. However, you could go into a deep sleep. No more pain. No more suffering. Wouldn't that be more enjoyable than this right now? You won't die, though your life will surely end. Let me halt your suffering." She pressed her lips for the final time against his forehead.

Just as Jack lost consciousness, he heard her hiss almost inaudiabley, "Stay out of my way."

And the world went black.

**...**

Jack woke up laying flat on the pond in Burgess. It was winter (huh?), meaning the pond was frozen over thick, the ground was hidden by a blanket of snow, and the leafless trees held both fresh snow and icicles. The sky was cloudy, the sun not particularly bright. His staff was nowhere to be found. His arms weren't even numb.

"Ooo, nice place!" came a familiar voice.

Jack sat up using his his hands to push himself of the ground, fully awake.

Standing across the ice was a boy around his (physical) age. The guy had short red hair, bright green eyes that seemed to pop out, fair skin covered in freckles, and wearing a simple cotton shirt with suspenders and trousers. He smiled widely, looking around in amusement. When his eyes fell on the other teenager, his smile widened into a grin. Judging by the voice, it was Daniel, the voice who helped them out with the Ice Queen's realm.

"My baby sister's a little crazy, huh?"

**...**

**_storygirl99210_: Well, you're right about some things! Haha, no, she doesn't want to kill Jamie.**

**_NameNinjaStar77_:Thank you! Yeah, I guess it was a little overboard. I was just trying to show he could be over-protective and since there was nothing he could do to change what happened - yeah. I'm sorry! I wanted to check back in with that aspect of the story! And don't worry, she will. :)**

**_AgentBugs_: Thanks! :) I've heard of him and do know somes things, but not a whole lot. He's...definately something else. I've heard the rumor, too. I was kind of fascinated by it for a while. I'll explain the nightmare. There are two reasons for it. First, it gives Pitch power. Second, some people believe nightmares are caused by the sub-conscious trying to heal itself and get over a tramautic incident. Basically, it's guilt over her brother's death that's getting to her. :/**

**_E_ (first review): ...I was getting to that. I guess we think alike? :P**

**_E_ (second one): /Author blushes/ Thanks for the compliment, but even if I knew how to send it in, I don't think I would. I'm kind of self-conscious about this fic. (And everything else I write). I don't even let my family read my stuff and my friends don't even know I write. But thank you for the encouragement!**

**_Immortal Bubblewrap_: That's a relief! And I'm too into this to abandon it just yet (hopefully never get the urge to). (:**


	12. Backstories Begin

**Fanfiction is not-profit stories written by fans and/or internet trolls. Usually, they have nothing to do with the original stories, other than the fact they are based on the stories and stealing credit for them if they are not disclaimed. Which reminds me, I don't have any credit to take for RotG, so it ain't mine. (Gawd, this has become a stupid habit. This is what happens when I get writers' block! I write useless disclaimers! O.o)**

**Okay, only three or four more chapters left! By the way, this has been cut down again! It was getting way to long! I even cut down what the others were up to to just a mention! Don't worry, they'll appear either next or the chapter after. I'm not entirely happy with this chapter, and it gets weird if you ask me.**

**Warning! More than implied child abuse inside!**

Pitch reveled in the fear flowing through him, given from the scared children all around the world. It was magnificient progress he was making; not a full three days since the Ice Queen made her first real appearance in centuries to release one child from her hold, and he already had half the world's children (literally millions) cowering under blankets and wetting themselves in bed! It was such a wonderful feeling. Soon, the guardians would witness just exactly what that meant.

He should thank that naive woman, he really should. After all, the child she kept to herself for three centuries - the fear she had inside her seemed to grow and grow and grow, laying dormant until the right oppurtunity. That, plus the fear her ingrate older brother felt at the prospect of losing her now - it was immense! And it was all the power he needed to start a new company of nightmares to send out and frighten little children, older children - even young teenagers! All the more fuel for his powers. All thanks to Silvia.

It was such a shame their terms had ended so bitterly. They had worked so well together before.

From where he was standing, he could hear whimpering coming from one of the cages hanging above. The younger Frost was in the middle of a frightful nightmare, one where she re-lived her brother's death, imagined she had to face her family's anger and grief, and other trivial yet frightening senarios thrown into the mix.

As delightful as her fear in her sleep and downright terror when she was awake were, the girl was beginning to out grow her use. If it weren't for her brother, by now she would've been just another frightened child. His interest in her was waning as her usefulness depleted. Once he was finished with her brother, after he had fed off the final bit of fear, she would be all but useless. He had no further plans to keep her around.

No, he wouldn't kill her. He was wasn't (ironically) _that_ much of a monster. He doubted she _could_ die at this point, anyway. No, he would release her. Simple as that. The girl would be just another child he loved to generally scare, more than likely scarred for life at what she'll have witnessed.

However, the guardians wouldn't get off that easily, not even close. It was true they were immortal, he couldn't kill them either.

But anything could be destroyed.

Little by little, he would pick away at the back of their minds, bringing long forgotton fears and tradgedies to mind. Of course, the guardians would no doubt push such thoughts to the back of their minds. But they would stick, growing more and more persistant that they were paid attention to, until the dreadful thoughts were all they could think of. Would they be afraid or vulnerable, then? Still no. That would the point he would add on to the thoughts, making them much more...unpleasant and realistic. Uncomfortable feelings would arise, eventually. He would make sure these illusion would take over their minds completely.

All the while they would be surrounded by nightmares, desperately trying to fight off thousands at a time. Unfocused and feeling dreadful, their movements would become sluggish.

Of course, the phsycological bit was only for Pitch's amusement. If it didn't work, well, hundreds of thousands of nightmares would take care of the guardians, anyway.

As for Frost...

A loud horse neigh suddenly echoed off the walls and cages, breaking Pitch out of his thoughts. A fearling stallion galloped up to him, a look of panic etched on its face.

"Yes, what is it?" he asked the nightmare, annoyed at the thought something could be wrong.

The nightmare neighed its explaination of why it was so panicked. As it continued explaining every last detail, the Nightmare King's visage grew from mere annoyance to pure outrage. He waited for the stallion to finish with the last detail to bellow "_WHAT_?" It echoed off the empty walls, sounding much louder. Frustrated, he turned the now startled fearling back into black sand.

Frost and the rabbit had disappeared into the Ice Queen's realm! The ONE place he couldn't enter, the ONLY place he couldn't extract fear from, no matter how great or obvious! They were untouchable while inside her realm. Her realm, being cut off from the world in all but a literal sense, was untraceable and near impossible to get into. Her banishment and magic had set that barrier in place. The only way inside was either with the woman herself or being invited. How had those two...?

Silvia had her own grand scheme in place. Of course. That had to be stopped before it interfered with his own, whatever her's were. He should have kept a better eye on her. After the last time they met in person, he certainly didn't need her around this time. (His neck had taken decades to stop hurting.) In his all but undealt-with scaring and glee, he'd forgotton how dangerous Silvia could be.

Not only that, but Mother Nature was leading the other three pests right to him. He would have thought this perfect if it were not that brat bringing them.

Pitch couldn't really remember why he hated her so much. (Especially that name; 'Terra' irked him to no end.) Every time he tried to think he got a massive headache. Somewhere along the way, he decided not to bother trying to remember. It was more pain than it was worth. But she had almost always kept her distance. The girl stayed in her garden realm, a nuetral party. (Why were all the nuetral parties suddenly going good?) He thought they had a mutual disgust of each other, a silent truce to steer clear of one another. Other than his one time offer for Frost, he hadn't touched her beloved seasons and, until now, she had stayed out of his way. What was she doing?

Stupid, insufferable brat.

A sharp pain suddenly seized Pitch's skull, like daggers. He grabbed the side of his head, digging his nails into his temples.

_"Daddy loves Seraphina..."_

The pain intensified. Pitch howled. Just as quickly as the phrase had popped into mind, it was gone, forgotton. The pain subsided to a dull throbbing. His arms fell uselessly to his sides as the last of the pain faded away. He exhaled deeply.

During his little episode, fearlings had crept out of the shadows, surrounding him. They watched him wearily. Pitch pulled a face, expecting the fearlings to retreat at his half-hearted snarl. After a moment, they did. Hmph. The Nightmare King turned his back to them, instead choosing to gaze at the cage above his head.

Infernal subordinates. He had to think of a plan to deal with Frost and the rabbit, not them.

**...**

"Very nice place!" Daniel exclaimed. "Reminds me of the woods."

Almost immediately, the area that was the pond changed. The two boys were in some kind of woodland. It was, by guess, early spring. Jack stood up fast, alarmed. He saw the Daniel standing in a small stream, kicking one foot around in the water happily. He took no notice of Jack.

"Hey!" he called out.

Daniel jerked his head towards him.

Once again the area changed. They stood in North's workshop, specifically in front of the globe.

"WHOA!" Daniel exclaimed, admiring the globe. "Amazing! I've wanted to see this place for about five-hundred and fifty years!" Laughing to himself, he skipped around. Soon he jumped onto the globe. "What's this button do?" he stomped on a light. When nothing happened he frowned childishly, shrugged as if he didn't care in the first place, and hopped off.

The area once again changed back to the woodland.

He bounded up to Jack. "I'm Daniel, by the way. Daniel Edgar Icing! Please don't comment on the name! I hate 'Edgar'." He stuck out a hand stiffly, expecting the other to take it.

Jack just stared at him like he was nuts. Out of _all_ the kooky stuff that had happened the past few days, _this_ was the strangest (and that's saying something). What was this place anyway?

"Uhh..."

Daniel's smile faltered and he lowered his hand. He rubbed the back of his head, smiling sheepishly. "Sorry. I haven't actually met anyone in - seventeen years before the first ice age! I also apologize if I use certain words wrong. English isn't my native language."

"You said the Ice Queen was your sister," he changed the subject.

The other teen nodded. "Yeah."

Jack shook his head. This was too crazy. "I don't get what's going on."

"Well, then let me explain," Daniel offered cheerfully. "What do you want to know first?"

Why not start simple? "For starters, what is this place? How did I get here?"

Another change of scenery. The room changed into a much simpler one. The floor was wooden boards, it had a crummy-looking bed, a simple dresser, and plain walls. Daniel moved away from the door to flop down on the bed.

"Ehhh, that's a little complicated," he said. "I can say I pulled ya in here. Otherwise Silvie's magic would'a put ya in a forever-lasting coma."

"Your sister," Jack said.

"Yes, little Silvie's my sister. Can we get past that now?"

"Sorry."

"S'okay. It is a shocker, I guess."

"Why did you pull me here? What IS here?" Jack walked to the side of the bed.

The red-head flipped over on his back. "I couldn't let Silvie practically kill you. Unlike me, you've got a second, important life."

"'Unlike you'?" Jack asked. "You're...?"

"Dead," he confirmed. "Died when I was fifteen. Got sick. Silvie was only five."

Jack hopped up on the dresser. "Sorry. So, is this, like, purgatory or something?"

Daniel shrugged and grinned wryly. "Maybe. Maybe not. I don't know what purgatory is. All I know is that one minute I'm panicking to breath and the next I'm staring at my sister and me, kind of depressed. The next thing I knew, I was here, sifting through my memories. This is my old bedroom, by the way."

Another change. Now they at the Tooth Palace. Daniel was laying on the floor and gravity dragged Jack's feet to the ground.

"So you've been to the Tooth Palace?" he asked skeptically.

"The what?" the freckled teen sat up. "Oh. Nope. These are your memories. It seems like the place is going back and forth between us."

"So - What?" If he wasn't dead and this was Daniel's, uh, memories, how was HE here? (Aside from the delusional theory forming in his head.)

"Think of it this way," the red-head explained, "Everyone has a conscious, right? Not the voice in your head telling you right from wrong. Like our individual thoughts and feelings. Are you following so far?"

"Yeah," he replied.

"And it's generally believed that when we die that consciousness - or soul, whatever - seperates from our bodies," he continued.

"Sure."

"I guess I'm sort of like a ghost. I don't_ have_ a body. I died. Did not come back. That's why I can't be seen no matter what. This place - I guess it's like my essance. Now that I think about it, bringing you here is a little creepy." He mock shuddered and laughed. "If I'm not paying attention to the outside world, I kind of - go_ inside _myself. Like being lost in thought or daydreaming. Sorry if this is a bit surreal and crazy. I've just been thinking about it for quite a long time and this what I came up with."

"They can't see you no matter what," the winter spirit murmered to himself. "Can your sister?" he asked louder.

Daniel shook his head. "She can't even hear me. I don't know why. She might have thought I passed on or sub-consciously blocked me out. I kind of try to talk to talk to some of Silvie's guests, or in your case, enemies. Most don't hear me. The ones that do are either really young or out of the ordinary. And they just ignore me."

Jack felt a pang of sympathy for the freckled boy. He had it worse than Jack ever did. Jack had a second life. Other childhood 'myths' and children who believed could see him and hear him. Daniel didn't even have that. He was all alone. He didn't at the least have a rival to mess with when bored.

"It gets lonely, yeah," Daniel said, as if reading his thoughts. "But hey, it's worth it." He smiled. "I get to watch Silvie all the time. With me around, she's never alone. I never want to leave her alone again. Not after I died." He stretched his arms out before letting them fall to the side.

The Tooth Palace changed to an old fashioned bakery. All kinds of cakes, cupcakes, and pies of every flavor and color.

"What happened?" Jack asked. "How did you, er..." Die? How did the Ice Queen become who she was? If he watched her all the time, what was she planning? Questions like these buzzed through his mind. He just couldn't decide which to ask first.

"Another weird thing," Daniel continued pensively, "is I can get an idea of what someone is feeling if their around Silvie. I guess it's part of being a 'ghost' or whatever I am."

Was Jack sure he wasn't just delusional? This sounded more far-fetched than the idea this whole dream/memory scape thing. Yeah, definately hallucinating. Now how to wake up and get Jamie out of the witch's realm?

"I guess the best way to explain it," Daniel said, walking up to the door and taking the handle, tearing Jack from his thoughts, "is to show ya."

He opened it. Jack peered outside, then walked up to the other's side.

It looked like summer out. The street was almost empty, save the child here and there. Nearest to the bakery sat a little girl of about five years old. She had carrot-colored hair, fair skin without freckles, and what looked like green eyes. The girl appeared a lot like Daniel. She wore a plain, pink dress. The girl was drawing in the dirt road with her fingers pictures of hearts, stars, and a poorly drawn castle with a moat around it.

Jack stuffed his hands in his hoodie pocket. "Is that the Ice Queen?"

"Silvia Rose Icing," Daniel confirmed, exiting the bakery. "Our parents owned a bakery. Dad loved making cake and icing, hence our last name. Pretty weird, now that I think about it. Oh well. Better than Andrew Coal, who will appear any minute now. His dad mined coal for a living." He chuckled. "Come out here."

Jack did so.

He noticed Silvia was humming to herself, seemingly perfectly fine to be by herself.

"Doesn't she have friends to play with?" he asked.

"Not really. Silvie's always been an odd one. Plus, a lot of the kids her age had older siblings that hated me, so they stayed away from her, too. She never seemed bothered, though. She was shy as it was."

Three boys around fifteen, maybe slightly younger, stalked up the street towards them. The leader had pale skin, blonde hair, and brown eyes. The other two were twins, tan from being out in the sun so long, black hair, and blue eyes. Their clothes weren't too different from Daniel's.

Daniel cocked his head boredly. "Andrew's the blonde. Lucas and Blaine are the the twins. All thirteen, though they could pass for fifteen. The twins are nothing but followers. Andrew hated me for shoving snow down his shirt once. He held a grudge over that forever. Proves how stupid and violent-prone he was. Usually led to what we're about to see."

The three stepped behind the girl. She saw their shadows and looked back at them, scowling. "What d'ya want, Andrew?"

"What about us?" the twins complained.

"Go away." Silvia turned back to her drawings.

"Don't you wanna go play with the wolves in the woods?" Andrew asked snidely. "Wolf girl! That's where they found you; being raised by wolves!"

"They thought you were human so they brought you back," one twin laughed.

"I don't get how," the other said. "You're obviously a mutt."

"Wolves can bite your heads off!" Silvia huffed. "If I'm a wolf, I can bite your head off! So shoo!"

"She's stubborn already," Jack commented. "Not very shy."

"Because she knows I'm not far away," Daniel smirked. "Otherwise she would've took off to find our parents by now." He sighed. "Okay, time to show what I meant, I guess."

"How?"

"Just wait for it."

**..**

Andrew sneered at her comment. How dare she tell him off like that! Stupid little girl! She ought to learn her place! Big kids ruled and little kids were supposed to do whatever they said. Especially annoying Icings!

He kicked the brat, causing her to fall on her stomach.

Ha! Not so demanding now!

The little brat started screaming. Not only was that SO ANNOYING, it meant that idiot brother of her's would come if he heard her!

Andrew did the first thing to come to mind. He stomped his foot on the back of her head, shoving her face in the dirt. The kid kicked and screamed a muffled yell.

The twins burst out laughing. Andrew beamed, feeling his ego inflate. It was nice to be on top.

That is, until he was thrown roughly to the ground. A seething Daniel glared down at him. The twins stopped laughing.

"How many times do I have to tell you to leave her alone! It was a stupid snowball fight when we were little kids! Get over it!" the older boy roared.

Daniel lunged. He threw a punch at Andrew's nose, surely breaking it. It hurt like heck! Andrew tried to punch back, only to have his wrist held back by the older boy, who punched him again. _**GAH**_!

**..**

Jack shook his head, stumbling back. The second Daniel and Andrew continued to brawl as Silvia burst into tears and the twins backed away. Adults started to gather around to see what they were doing/pull them away from each other. Okay, that was really weird. It was almost like he could hear the bully's thoughts. He didn't want to do that again. It was almost like _Jack_ was the one who wanted to shove a kid's face in the ground. Ugh.

The first Daniel grinned at him. "Still wanna know what happened next?"

The scene changed before Jack could open his mouth to answer.

It was winter. They were in the woodland again. Silvia and Daniel, dressed in warmer clothing, were walking, or rather skipping, around.

"We're not allowed to go very far," the memory Daniel said. "It's 'too cold', and 'dangerous'. Except..."

"We always explore the woods!" Silvia giggled. "We've never gotton into trouble."

"Adventure is more exciting than rules," Daniel declared. "We'll be home before dark anyway. What's the worry? All the bears are hybernating and wolves stay away from our town."

"Yeah," his sister agreed. "Where are the bees at?"

The older boy gave her a funny look. "Bees? You mean those buzzing things that sting you? Why do you care?"

"Bees are my favorite animal!" she huffed. "Why aren't they out in winter?"

"Favorite animal! All these years I thought bees were bugs!" he faked surprise.

"Daniel..." Silvia warned.

"Relax, Silvie. Dumb joke. I don't know. Eating honey. Sleeping. Stalking annoying little sisters who ask stupid questions. Hey! Maybe you'll see them tonight!" he laughed.

"That's stupid!" she glared at him.

She bent down, picked up as much snow as she could, and flung it at him.

"Hey!" he shouted. "That is NOT how you make a snowball! Kids these days. No idea how to make a proper snow ball. So sad." He grabbed a handful of snow, compacted it, and threw. It hit the little girl in the shoulder.

The two laughed, continuing their snowball fight. More than once Daniel purposely stayed in place close to his sister, allowing himself to get hit. In return, at the end he smashed a snowball in her hair and ruffling it, throughly messing up her hair.

By that point it was getting dark, the sky fading from light gray to dark.

"Let's go home," the older boy suggested. "Before Mom goes on a rampage."

"Okay!"

Silvia followed her brother happily.

"Hey, Daniel?" she asked. "What's your favorite animal?"

"Birds, I guess," he replied absently, taking her hand. "Why?"

"What kind of bird?" she asked.

"Whadd'ya mean what kind! Birds are birds," he told her. "I dunno, nightingales?"

"Why?" she asked.

"Because," he answered.

"Because why?"

"Because."

"Because why?"

"Because."

"Daniel!"

"Daniel!" he mocked in a high voice.

The little girl's already red face darkened. "Stop copying me!"

"Stop copying me!" he screeched playfully.

"I'll tell!" she threatened.

"I'll tell!"

"DAN_**EIL**_!" she screamed.

He winced. "Fine, sorry! Just stop screaming."

Silvia smiled, happy to win.

"Just don't come crying to me when the goblins under your bed try to eat you."

Her face dropped. "G-goblins? What goblins? There are no goblins under my bed!"

Daniel laughed. "May-be! Maybe not! I know I used to have goblins under my bed."

"Liar!"

"We were really close," the dead Daniel commented sadly. "I picked on her, she annoyed me, and cost me my chance at having this one girl as a girlfriend, yeah. But she was still a good kid. Do you know anything about diseases?"

Jack shook his head. "Not really."

"Hm. Well, I think the disease that got me went exinct. I'm not sure it still exists, but probably not. It was really weird and highly infectious. It turned into a real plague, killing most of my home town," the red-head explained.

"I'm sorry," the winter spirit said, not knowing how else to respond.

"It got most of my family, all of my friends and enemies, and in the end, the survivors left. There were only about four of them anyway."

The scene changed.

The Icing family, including the parents, who looked exactly like their children, were on the second floor of the bakery, which was the family's home. The room was small, only contaning a table, chiars, and cupboards. Three doors led to different rooms, persumabely bedrooms.

The family was sitting at the table, eating dinner.

"My mom was the first victim," Daniel explained. He crossed his arms.

Mrs. Icing yawned, picking at her food as her husband and kids chatted excitedly.

Jack glanced out the window. No snow, meaning it wasn't winter.

**..**

"That fifth time you've fought with Andrew this month," Mr. Icing commented.

"He asked for it," Daniel said. "If he has a problem with me, he shouldn't take it out on Silvie."

"Yeah!" Silvia agreed, stabbing her food in agreement, splattering it everywhere.

Silence. Nothing happened. The three looked over at Mrs. Icing expectantly. Usually she got mad when Silvia or Daniel did that, almost always resulting in a long scolding. Instead they saw her starting to doze off sitting up.

"Is Mom okay?" Daniel asked.

"She's probably tired," Mr. Icing said.

"So I'm not in trouble?" Silvia asked eagerly.

"For once," her dad replied. "Sarah?" He nudged her arm. "Wake up."

Mrs. Icing groaned. "Five more minutes..."

Mr. Icing stood up. "Come on, off to bed." He took her by the arm to another room.

Daniel waited until they were gone to say, "I think this calls for a food fight."

Silvia giggled. "THEN she'll wake up for real and we'll be in trouble."

**..**

They were downstairs in the bakery. Silvia was sneaking a piece of cake outside. Daniel watched her from behind the counter, grinning. Their father was talking with one of the customers, so he didn't notice. Daniel recognized her as Mrs. Cooper.

"Sarah's come down with a fever?" Mrs. Cooper asked. "So has my little James and my sister, Sally. You remember her?"

"Of course, we grew up together," Mr. Icing scoffed. "It's just the season. Everyone's coming down sick."

"I don't know," Mrs. Cooper. "I heard Rhonda Cook complaining that her husband hasn't gotton out of bed in four days. What kind of ordinary fever lasts that long without breaking at least once?"

"Jasper's always been prone to getting sick. Are you going to pay me or not?"

**..**

Now Daniel was at someone else's house. It was one of his friends, Alan.

"I over heard my dad talking the other day," Daniel brought up.

"Let me guess; he ran out of frosting?" Alan joked.

"Nah. Mrs. Cooper was telling him how everyone's getting fevers."

"Is that so?" Alan asked. "My family doesn't have anyone getting any fevers."

"Yeah. I was just thinking about it," the red-head said. "My mom's been sick for three days. Usually her's break by the third."

"Old people get sick more."

"Mrs. Cooper said her son was sick."

"James? Babies get sick, too."

"He's four."

"Same thing."

"I don't know." Daniel shrugged, deciding to change the subject. This one was getting boring. "Wanna go prank the Coals?"

Alan grinned wickedly. "Of course!"

**..**

Silvia and Daniel were in his room, dressed in their night clothes.

"Puke is gross," Silvia commented.

"Yep."

"Mommy just has the flu, right?"

"What else could it be?" her brother asked. "It is that time of year."

"I don't want to get the flu," the younger kid stated. "I hate puking."

"Who doesn't?" the older boy asked. "Now why are you in my room again?"

**..**

"Get out of my way before I fall down the stairs," Daniel's mother warned, glaring at her only son as he pushed past her down the stairs toward the bakery. "I'm still feeling dizzy. If I fall and break my neck, I'll haunt you forever, screaming in your ear all the time."

"Nice threat," Daniel joked. "Is being sick ruining your ability to strike fear into my heart or are you just umotivated today?"

His mother growled. "Move, Daniel, or I'll - "she broke off, coughing violently into her hand.

"You okay?" he asked when she stopped, only to stare at her palm in horror. Arm shaking, she turned her palm out toward him. It was covered in red liquid. Daniel stepped up on higher step in surprise. He'd never seen someone cough up blood before.

"I'm coughing blood," she swayed slighty. "Bloo- !" Another coughing fit seized her. Red liquid dripped from her one hand as the other pressed against the wall for suuport.

Daniel grabbed his mother's shoulders and turned his head towards the bakery. "DAAAD!"

**..**

"Why can't I see Mommy?" Silvia demanded.

She, Daniel, and Alan were walking aimlessly around Alan's family's farm yard. Alan was supposed to be doing his chores, but decided to slack off instead when he saw his friend and his sister came walking up the road.

"Because she's sick, of course," Daniel replied. He didn't want her knowing about their mother coughing up blood two days ago or the fact she could barely move now. He didn't want her getting scared that she would, to.

"My dad's the same way," Alan told them, petting one of the family's two cows. "Mom won't let me anywhere near him. Lots of people are getting sick." He gave Daniel a scared look that said, 'They're going through the same thing'.

"Why aren't we?" Silvia asked.

"Don' know," Alan answered. "Don' really care either. All I know is that until he gets better, I'm stuck with all the farm work!" He straightened up suddenly. "Hey, do you two..."

"Nope!" Daniel charged away. "And I'm too lazy to learn!"

"Huh?" Silvia looked confused as ever.

"He just doesn't want to work," Alan rolled his eyes. "Hey, is it me, or it getting really cold out? I'm getting goosebumps."

The little girl stared at him funny. "It's summer. It's not cold! There's not even any wind!"

**..**

"Now Alan's sick!" Mrs. Farmer, Alan's mother, told Daniel's father one day while she was buying a small cake. Daniel, who had just woken up, hid on the staircase. "Just in time for his birthday! And Lewis is coughing up blood, now!"

"Sarah can't move much, either," Mr. Icing told her.

"Every house in town has at least one sick person, Isaac," she said. "This isn't any ordinary flu bug."

"It'll pass with time, Vera."

"It better! I have my brother and nephew helping with the farm. And they're fishermen! Don't know anything about farmwork at all. We'll be broke sooner or later."

**..**

"WHAT IN THE WORLD! SARAH! WAKE UP!"

Daniel shot up in bed, wide awake at his father's scream. He looked out his window. It had to be the middle of the night.

"GET UP! GET UP! PLEASE!"

He jumped out of bed, threw open his door, and looked out. His sister did the same. She looked frightened out of her wits. He scooped her up into his arms, staring at his parents bedroom door as their father continued to scream.

"What's going on?" Silvia asked, clinging to his nightshirt.

"I have no idea," he lied quietly.

**..**

There was no hiding anything from Silvia now. Daniel hated seeing her cry. Especially at their mother's funeral. He held her hand tightly, tears of his own falling.

The next two weeks were filled with similar occurances. People were waking up or walking into a loved one's room to find them dead in bed. Screams filled households and relatives were beginning to fear they would get sick and die, too.

No one could figure out what this epidemic was. It started as an _ordinary_ flu, then dizziness set in, coughing up blood, exhaustion keeping the victim in bed for days, and suddenly the whole body seemed to shut down completely. It was so simple, which made it all the more scarier.

It only took two and a half weeks to for half the town to _at least _become infected, let alone die off.

**..**

"Look! A wolf!" Silvie pointed out twelve days later.

"Stay away from it, Silvie. If it doesn't see us, it can't attack us," Daniel told her.

Their father had told him to take his sister into the woods to play. There was talk of burning the bodies of the dead - even the ones already buried - in attempt to stop the spread of disease. He didn't want Silvia hearing anything about this, or for either of them to witness their mother being dug up if it came to that.

"I like wolves," his sister said randomly. "They're pretty."

"Don't forget vicious."

"I like bears, too. Baby bears are cute."

"Uh-huh."

Silvie watched the wolf sniffed the ground and suddenly dart in the other direction. She turned to her brother. "Why haven't Andrew and the others picked on me lately? How come you're never with Alan or Rachel, or your other friends anymore?"

Daniel swallowed. Shock seemed to have set in for her, making her unable to comprehend just how many people were infected, despite the many funerals going on.

"Uh, well. They're... Can't I play with my younger without any questions? C'mon, Silvie! Andrew and his goons are scared of me and my friends understand!" he lied, trying to appear cheerful. "But, I guess I can go play with them and let you get bullied if you want..."

"No!" she shouted. "I like playing with you! Andrew's a jerk, too!"

"Let's play tag," he suggested. "I'm it. Run!"

**..**

"DANIEL!"

Daniel jolted up to find his little sister in bed with him. She looked scared beyond belief.

"What?" he asked anxiously.

"Daddy's sick! He's throwing up. He's not _really_ sick and gonna die, is he?"

**..**

Daniel found himself extremely tired a week and a half later, two days after his dad died. He managed to prevent Silvia from seeing the remaining townspeople drag the body away to be burned. Why was this happening? What could they do? No one wasn't any closer to finding out a cure than they had been when their mom died. It wasn't like home remedies were working.

"We're all alone," Silvia cried next to him one night. Ever since their dad died, she'd insisted on sleeping in her brother's room. Daniel didn't object. "Everyone's dying!"

"I'm still here," he muttered quietly. "I won't leave you alone."

"I said WE!" she cried. "Why's everyone dying?"

"It's a plague, Silvie. No one knows why."

"They should!" she sniffed. "I don't _like it!"_

"Well neither do I!" he retorted. He ran a hand through his hair, sighing. "We'll be fine. I promise. Once this all over..." What? What would they do?

"Don't play tricks..." she sniffed.

Now that he thought about it, the fifteen year old wondered if they would survive this. Why would they? Because they were lucky? If they were lucky, this thing would've never happened at all. Their parents would still be alive.

The next day while the little girl ate lunch, Daniel yawned. It was about mid-day. Why not take a nap...?

**..**

"This is the night I died," Daniel told Jack when the scene changed back to the red-head's room.

As they strolled further and further down memory lane, more thoughts and emotions flooded Jack as if they were his own memories.

The memory Daniel and Silvia were laying in the older red-head's bed.

"She was there?" he asked.

The other teen nodded.

Jack's shoulders sagged. Oh no. Even if she did grow up to be a witch, no kid deserved to be there when their older brother die. (Why did that seem familiar?)

**..**

Daniel stared out the window at the night sky. Stars and a cresent moon gleamed against the black background. The corners of his blanket was covered in blood that he'd hacked up. He felt so tired. He didn't want to at least roll over on his side, or continue stroking his half asleep sister's hair, his body was so exhausted. But he knew it somehow comforted her, so he did.

"You're a liar," she told him sleepily, clinging to his nightshirt.

"How am I liar?" he asked her, wondering at the same time how he could be so tired and yet awake.

"You said we'd both be fine. You're sick."

"I am fine."

"Liar."

"I'm not going anywhere, Silvie," he attempted to smile at her. "I'm not going to just leave you all alone, by yourself. I promise."

"Hm."

Daniel continued to stare out the window long after she fell asleep. Who was he kidding? Not a single person so far had survived the sickness. He wasn't even sure anyone else _was_ still alive. It wasn't as if he and Silvia were leaving the house to check. They didn't go to the woods anymore either. Who was going to take care of her when -

Why wasn't he inhaling or exhaling? Breathing, why wasn't he breathing?! Daniel tried to suck in some air. His nose and mouth wouldn't listen. No, no, no, no, no! His vision became fuzzy. NONONONONO! The moon, stars, and window pane disappeared in the blackness.

The black eventually faded. A transparant Daniel stood with his back to the window. He stared at the two bodies in confusion, before disappearing.

**..**

"By the time I got out of this place, Silvie had already woken up. They were already dragging my body away," the red-head explained without any emotion in his voice what-so-ever.

"That's just horrible," Jack moaned in despair.

"That's not the half of it. Just wait 'til you see how this leads to my sister becoming the Ice Queen. I actually want to take a few of the people's heads off."

**..**

Silvia struggled against Mrs. Cooper's arms. They were outside. Mr. Miller cradled Daniel's body in his arms, walking towards a large pit. The bodies of Mrs. Miller, Bradley Fisher, Anna Fisher, and Lucy Cook were already laying in it along with a wood pile. Mrs. Cook and Cassandra Fisher looked on sadly.

"NO! WHAT ARE YOU DOING? PUT HIM DOWN!" Silvia cried.

"Oh, show some respect, Jacob!" Mrs. Cooper yelled. "Wait until she's passed out asleep!"

"We have to stop the spreading," he said emotionlessly.

He dumped Daniel's body unceremoniously on the pile.

"NOOOOO!"

He pulled a match out of his pocket.

Mrs. Cooper forced Silvia to face her instead of the pile.

"DON'T!"

Mr. Miller dropped the match on the wood, setting it ablaze. The shadows danced across the woods behind Mrs. Cooper.

Silvia fainted.

**..**

There was no point staying in a town of only four people. That's what Cassandra told Mrs. Cook and Mrs. Cooper when Silvia came to. She found herself in Mr. Miller's wagon with the other two woman. Mr. Miller was driving. They were going to the country's capital, they had explained to her. Fall had begun, meaning it was getting colder and the disease was going away. The quarentine was over. Since the capital was the closest city, being only thirty miles away, that's where they were heading.

As if Silvia cared. Her family, her brother - all dead. They burned his body. _Burned_. She didn't care about anything else right now. Her brother promised this wouldn't happen. Liar. He was a liar.

"Oh, she's crying again, poor thing," Mrs. Cook said, pulling her close.

Silvia squirmed out of her grasp. "Don't touch me!" she hissed.

A transparant Daniel sat in the corner, utterly disappointed in himself.

**..**

"Is that a castle?" Silvia couldn't help but ask as they got closer to the capital.

"Yes," Mrs. Cook answered, admiring the stone turrents. "That's where the King, Queen, and young Prince live."

"Hm." Silvia didn't really care who lived there. She just didn't expect to see castles in her new home.

**..**

"A castle?" Jack asked quizically. "I thought this all took place before the ice ages. There were castles back then?"

Daniel shrugged, stuffing his hands into his pockets. "You didn't live back then. What do you know? Besides, freezing practically the entire world set mankind back a few thousand years or so."

**..**

Miss Sadie's Orphanage for Unwanted Children. What a lovely name.

"I'm not going in there. I don't want to!"

"Honey, you don't expect us to take care of you, do you?" Cassandra asked.

"You're my neighbors!" she shouted. "The only people I know! Of course I..." she trailed off. Silvia, in truth, didn't want anything to do with these people. On the other hand, they were the only people around who weren't strangers, people she'd known her entire life.

"We're all going seperate ways," Mr. Miller said. "You're going here."

"I don't want to!" she started to scream. " I DON'T WANT TO!"

"Don't act so spoiled," Mrs. Cook admonished her. "See Mrs. Cooper? She's already at the door. You're staying here and that's final. If you stop acting bratty, maybe someone will want you to take home."

The little red-head glared at her with as much venom as a five year could. Which wasn't much, especially compared to what she felt inside. No normal five year old should already feel boiling hatred.

An old woman with gnarled, leathery skin, hunched over, and dependant on a cane to walk marched over to the wagon with Mrs. Cooper.

"Silvia," Mrs. Cooper addressed her nervously. "This is Miss Penny. She's Sadie Holmes' daughter and the care taker of the orphanage."

Silvia glowered at her. Miss Penny glowered back.

"She looks terrible," the old hag declared.

Silvia thought she did too, worse in fact, but didn't say so. Her shyness was starting to kick in; she'd never been good at meeting strangers.

"Well, let's get her inside," Miss Penny said. "Go on, get out of there!"

She didn't move. She didn't want to stay with this woman.

"GET!" the hag hissed, grabbing Silvia's arm and pulling her.

The girl yelped.

Mrs. Cooper grabbed a hold of her tiny body, gently placing her on the ground. Miss Penny didn't let go of her arm. If anything, she tightened her grip. Without a word of goodbye to the adults, she dragged the kid toward the tall, brick building, dragging at her heels. Silvia looked back, silently begging for them to get her out of there. To her surprise, they didn't even so much as watch her go inside. They were already on their way through town.

**..**

"This is Silvia," Miss Penny announced to the other children. "She's five years old. Anything else you need to know, you'll get of her yourself. Carmen, she's your charge. Show her around and the routine. The rest of you, back to your chores!"

A pale, blonde girl of about fourteen years of age sagged her shoulders as the other children dispersed. She waited until the hag turned down the corrider away from the front hall to stand up straight. She smiled a little.

"Miss Penny's an a real hag, huh?"

"I already knew that," Silvia mumbled. She was feeling more and more exhausted by the minute.

"Yeah. Miss Sadie was nice, but she died a few years ago. Miss Penny hates kids. She usually just has us do chores all day," Carmen explained. "Try not to get into any trouble. She likes what she calls 'discipline', and her cane isn't just for walking."

"She's mean."

"What?" she couldn't quite hear what the younger kid said quietly.

"Nothin'."

"Okay. Let me show you where everything is."

**..**

At the end of the day, Carmen showed her the girls' dorm. It was a long room filled beds and a few dressers. She showed Silvia her new bed before heading across the room to her own. Other girls started to come in, their daily chores done.

By now, Silvia was completely exhausted. She wasn't sure why. She'd hardly moved the last two days. Funny.

Flopping down under the covers, she curled up in a ball. She didn't like this place. She wanted to go home, go play in the woods, listen to Daniel tease her, her mother scold her, her father let her eat the last of any cake batter, even be bullied by Andrew! Not abandoned here.

"Hey," she heard some of the other girls whisper. "I think the new girl's crying."

"She's whimpering."

"I did too when I got here."

"Make her shut up - I can't sleep with noise!"

"Hey! Keep it down over there!"

Silvia pulled the blanket over her head.

**..**

"Fat old cow," the eight year old muttered angerly to herself, examing her swollen ankles. "I'm not tall to reach the clothing line. How does she expect me to do laundry 'properly' when I can't reach the line!"

_Chomp_. "Doesn't talking to yourself mean you're crazy?"

Silvia looked up from her spot on the kitchen floor. The newest kid, a six year old named Louis who had arrived last week, stared at her, munching on an apple.

"It's not lunch time," she told him harshly. "Where'd you get that apple?"

"Over there, silly." He pointed to the bowl of apples on the counter. A stool was placed in front of it.

"Why did you grab it, you idiot?" she asked rudely.

"I got hungery," Louis answered, eyes widening sadly at her remark.

"If Miss Penny catches you eating that apple she'll thrash you."

"I - I didn't - It's just an apple! I didn't eat breakfast yet! I overslept!"

"Hmph. I don't know how you got away with that, but you'll get it big time if - "

Silvia froze. Footsteps and the sound of wood hitting wood sounded out in the hall. Louis looked fearful.

"Gimme that apple," she demanded.

"Why?" He started trembling.

"Just give it and go out the back door!" she barked.

The footsteps and cane sounds got closer. Louis didn't have time to hesitate. He chucked the fruit and charged out the door. Silvia caught it. She took a bite just in time for Miss Penny to slam open the kitchen door. Her eyes flared.

"What do you think you're doing, stealing food?"

"I was hungery," she retorted, chewing loudly. "You barely feed us in the morning."

"Why you little...!"

Silvia backed up against the wall as the hag walked over, lifting her cane.

**..**

"Sorry I got you in trouble," Louis apologized later that day while they were raking leaves.

Silvia poked a welt on her arm and winced. "Don't worry about it. Just don't do anything stupid again, 'cause I'm not taking another beating for you. You're just new is all."

"Sorry," he apologized again.

She patted his head, unsure of what else to do. "It's fine."

**..**

The now ten year old walked through the market, basket in one hand, money in her dress pocket.

"I need you to go shopping," Miss Penny had ordered. "I need eggs, apples, and milk. You had better not steal any of this money for yourself, or you'll get it good!"

"Stupid witch," she muttered under her breath. "I hate you."

"That's not very nice," a voice called.

Silvia looked up at whoever spoke. It was a woman selling candles. She was about twenty years younger than Miss Penny, who was old as dirt. She had a kind, wrinkled face, and a mischevious look in her eye.

"What ain't?" she asked, for surely she had said that too quietly for the woman to hear.

"Calling someone a witch and that you hate them," the old woman responded. "Not only is that a terrible thing to say, but it's an insult to witches everywhere."

"Witches live in caves," Silvia retorted, hoping the random comment would end the conversion quickly. If she wasn't back on time, she would get thrashed.

"Who told you that nonsense?" the woman chuckled.

Silvia didn't notice the transparant Daniel next to her scratch his head sheepishly. She was taken aback by the response.

"Witches certainly don't live in caves," she continued. "They live in houses, just like everyone else."

"How would you know?" she asked.

The old woman's smile didn't falter. "Well, I happen to know a few witches myself."

"Um..." How was she supposed to respond to that?

"So who was it you were cursing?"

The girl blinked. "Miss Penny," she responded, finding herself unable to keep silent and walk away.

The smile melted away. "Penny Holmes? Oh my, she's definately worth insulting. I grew up with her; she's always been nasty, especially to the poor children she houses. You don't happen to be one, do you?"

"Yes," she said automatically.

"Well," she said. "I'm sorry to hear that."

"I - I gotta go," Silvia said.

"Alright, go ahead."

Silvia ran off.

**..**

Once again, Silvia was the one picked to go out shopping. Walking around the market, bored, she completely forgot about the woman from the candle stand. Silvia had one more item to find before she went home, jam, and she couldn't find it anywhere.

Checking every stand, she came upon one filled with treats and candies. It was jam, but Silvia did stop. Miss Penny prohibited any sort of treats for the children. Silvia hadn't had any sugar since her father died. Looking at the candy was enough to make her drool.

"Well, fancy seeing you here again."

Silvia snapped out of it. The woman from before stood not two feet away, holding a basket of her own.

"Uh...hi," she greeted shyly.

"Making googly eyes at the candy, are we?" the woman smiled.

"Um, yeah."

"I used to love candies. Now I can't eat them; can't afford cavities at this age!" She laughed. "We never properly inroduced ourselves. My name is Maude. What's yours?"

"Silvia," she replied without thinking.

"How pretty!" Maude remarked. "Much better than my name. 'Maude' always reminds me of 'mud'. I always used to get teased for it. Then I would punch them in the face and never be bothered again. Are you going to buy any of that candy for yourself?"

"I can't. Miss Penny will know."

Maude frowned. "Penny Holmes has a wicked soul, I tell you. Here, I'll buy it. This can be our little secret. Or will she smell your breath to make sure you haven't consumed any?"

"Uhh..."

"What would you like, child?" she asked, browsing through the selection of treats. "I always liked chocolate, myself."

For the first time in five years, Silvia found herself smiling. She liked this Maude lady.

**..**

"Why don't you come over to my house for lunch today?"

Eleven year old Silvia shook her head. "If I don't get back on time, Miss Penny will have it in for me."

She pulled her sleeves downwards, hoping to hide the welts on her arms.

"It's only lunch. It doesn't take long if we eat lightly," Maude continued pursasively, eyeing Silvia's arms suspiciously.

"No thank you."

"I insist."

"Hmm..." Why not? She hated the orphanage food, anyway. And she hated going back there everytime she was sent out. Maude was nice and had taken to buying her sweets everytime she saw her. Plus, she showed her tricks that were even better than ones Daniel used to play. Why not? Because beatings were always around the corner, she reminded herself. "Sorry. Hey!"

Maude yanked her arm. Pulling up both her sleeves, the old woman saw the fresh, red markings covering her arms, along with the older purple ones.

"Did Penny do this?" she demanded.

"Yes," she couldn't keep herself from saying.

Maude growled. "I'm coming home with you. We're settling this now."

Silvia snatched her arms back, fearful. As much as she loved the idea of Miss Penny being chewed out, that could only lead to a more severe beating. Just the other day she broke Patrick's arm for accidently burning dinner. Who knew what she would do to Silvia. "No!"

"Sweetheart, I'm not sure you understand the severety of this. Penny needs a good bit of karma. You need to get out of that environment, as well as the other children."

**..**

"There you are, you lazy - " Miss Penny growled when Silvia got entered the house. She stopped when Maude followed her in. A look of fear crossed her face. She pointed an accusing finger at the woman. "You!"

"Hello, Penny," Maude greeted. "Let's have a talk in your office, shall we?"

**..**

Silvia never found out what exactly happened in Miss Penny's office that day. She did know that the old hag, while still mean, didn't seem to have the energy to thrash anyone ever again. She also went home with Maude that day.

"Huh?" she asked, not quite comprehending what she just heard.

"Isn't it obvious, child?" Maude replied. "I'm adopting you. I live alone. I happen to find your company enjoyable. Why not?"

Silvia was stupified. She remembered what had been said to hear six years ago. "_If you stop acting bratty, maybe someone will want you to take home._"

"By the way," Maude continued, eyes twinkling mischeviously. "Remember our first conversation? What _do_ you think of witches?"

"You're one, aren't you?" she pieced together.

Maude smiled.

**..**

"So, she's one the the Ice Queen learn witchcraft stuff from?"

"Yep! Glad you figured that out! Now we can skip to the next important part!"

"Wait, I'm still confused."

Daniel glared at him boredly as the scene changed. "About?"

"Who IS Maude? Why did she like Silvia so much, Mr. I-feel-others-emotions?"

"Simple; not everyone has the potential to become a witch. They were few in those days, and I have no idea how, but a witch knows potential witches, I guess. Silvia had the ability to become one. To be honest, the whole concept confuses me, too."

**..**

"Go away!"

"Why?"

"'Cause I said so, stupid!"

Fourteen year old Silvia walked down the street, trying to ignore the tan, dark haired boy following her. He had been following her all day. It was getting annoying!

"Why do you have orange hair?" he asked randomly.

Silvia rounded on him. "Why are you stupid? Go away!"

"I've never seen someone so angry!" he laughed. "Having a bad day?" the boy teased.

Silvia wished Maude had hurried up and taught her how to hex someone. Clenching her fists, she resisted the urge to punch him. "Thanks to you, yes!"

He cocked his head, reminding her of a dog. "Why?"

Silvia's eye twitched. "Stupid! Go! Away!"

Stupid laughed again. "This is fun!"

"That's it!"

Stupid dodged her punch. "Okay, sorry!"

"Sorry's not good enough!"

Stupid dodged another punch before turning around. Silvia chased him several blocks before he got the hint that she wasn't letting this go. He stopped and turned around, bracing himself for the punch. Silvia popped him in the eye. He fell back, covering his eye. He looked so pathetic.

"GAH!" he wailed. "You hit too hard!"

"And you're stupid enough to just let someone punch you!" she shot back.

"I didn't think you would stop chasing me 'til you did!"

Silvia exhaled deeply. "Well, maybe you aren't so stupid after all. Why were you following me?"

"I just wanted to know where you were going." He sat up, govering his eye with both hands. "You were such a hurry..."

"So you followed me?" Silvia wasn't convinced.

He smiled sheepishly. "I'm used to people telling me whatever I want to know."

"Great. Well, now that that's settled, go away."

**..**

"What part of go away did you not understand?" the red-head asked the next day as Stupid followed her home.

"You know how I had to explain this to my parents?" Stupid pointed to his black eye. "I had to tell them I fell and hit my face on a rock. You know how ridiculous I sounded?"

"Well, Stupid, considering the fact you are stupid, I'd say it was a pretty normal thing."

"Haha, you're so funny, I think I'll die laughing," he said sarcastically. "Stop calling me 'Stupid'. My name is Davis. Not 'Stupid'.

"I'll think about it," Silvia dead-panned.

Davis grinned. "What's your name?"

"Not telling."

"Not Telling? Okay, Not, where are you going?"

"... You want to get punched again, don't you, Davis?"

"Yes!" he cheered. "I'm not Stupid anymore."

"Nope," Silvia groaned. "You're just an idiot who doesn't know a thing about privacey."

"Still an improvement," he cheered.

Silvia fought the urge the smile at his idiotic antics.

**..**

"I think someone likes you," Maude brought up one night, several weeks later at dinner.

"No," Silvia said. "Someone's an idiot."

"I've seen how teenagers behave; yes, he's an idiot, but an infatuated idiot."

"Maude! That's disgusting!"

"He follows you around like a lost puppy," the old woman said. "He constantly tries to make you laugh, and I know you find his stupidity and attempts funny."

"So?" Silvia began to fill her plate with food.

"Isn't your birthday coming up?"

"What of it?"

"I have a good feeling he'll ask you on a date."

"Just no, Maude, no."

The older witch shrugged. "Surely you know who he is, though, right?"

"Davis?" she replied.

"Prince Davis, to be exact."

Silvia choked on her spit. "W-what?"

"I spoke to him earlier. He's been sneaking out of the castle for four months. He's bored of the castle life."

Silvia shook her head. "Great, not only is he a pest, he's a royal pest."

Maude chuckled. "You know you don't have much a social life as it is, dear."

"I don't like people, much. You know that."

"I think this a good thing. You could use someone your own age around."

"..."

**..**

"I really don't wanna explore my sister's love life," Daniel said. "It makes me want to puke, to be frank. Do you get where this going?"

"Uh, I think," Jack said. "Is this why calls herself a Queen? Because she ends up marrying a prince?"

"Bingo!" Daniel cheered. "Now we can skip along to..." His face dropped. "My sister's death and immortal life. It's really not a happy story. Not at all."

**...**

_**AgentBugs**_**: I was hoping that would make someone laugh! :D Trust me, the story only gets crazier and crazier. We'll see how the kisses effects are when Jack wakes up (hopefully next chapter). That mental image is weird. But I'm glad you got a laugh at it. I'm not Jackrabbit shipper, but I did crack a smile at the thought.**

_**E**_**: Interesting idea, but not what I have in mind. Thanks anyway.**

_**lolcentral101**_**: Thanks!**


	13. An Amused Death Comes into Play

**Okay, I do NOT know where this came from. I just had to write it! I hadn't even planned for Death to come into this in this way! He was going to be a minor character at the end! Now he's not quite that anymore! You'll find out everything else when I finish the rest of the backstories. If I need to, I'll switch the two chapters around later. For now, enjoy this quick update! Still three or four, maybe more chapters left 'cause I didn't plan this!**

_**...**_

Death lounged in his chair, his practical throne, bored as ever. No, not bored as _ever_. Just bored. Taking souls had been an eternal job and would be an eternal job. Hence, the mere thought of taking lives got boring at times. He lounged lazily, legs loosely crossed, nimble fingers curled up against his cheek, elbow supporting his head on the chair's arm. Behind him his overly large sythe rested easily aginst the wall. The room was not that bright and quite cold. Not freezing, freezing cold, but definately chilly. And Death, in his too big for his size cloak, smiled amusedly at the choas going on out in the world. Not just all the death - no, that was getting temporarily boring - but with the guardians' current struggle.

Death, or Grim M. Reaper, or just D., as he sometimes mockingly asks 'friends' to call him, stretched out suddenly, arms and legs untangling and extending, hands curling into fists, invisable toes almost trying to dislocate themselves. He stretches out his spine a little before curling back into place.

'He' is used loosely; Death doesn't mind if he is referred as a boy - in fact, he seemed to find it amusing - but he wouldn't take offense at all if one mistook him as girl. Death itself knew no gender, and this manifestation didn't either. He had an ambiguous body and a unisex voice timbre. One could think, looking at him, he was a lean young man or a flat chested teenage girl. His voice was low enough to be taken as male, but high enough another would think he was one of those girls whose voice was a bit deeper than others. All in all, he didn't care, he just found it amusing. But most seemed to take him as boy, which was just fine by him. Most cultures (but not all) did, anyway. Which was why it was so amusing.

Next to his throne, Cerberus whined, obviously just as bored as his master, if not more so. This amused Death all the more. He chuckled at his three-headed dog.

"Come now, Cerberus," he suddenly said, causing the dog's head to snap up at him. "Today is an exciting day!" he said, just above a whisper. "We'll find out if today I'll be taking an immortal's life. And if it's a certain immortal," he poked at his bottom lip with his middle finger playfully, "I'll get back one of my lost souls." He sat up slightly. "Actually, either way I might."

Cerberus cocked his head, wondering what his master was talking about, not sure which immortal or lost soul he meant.

Death noticed. He smiled amusedly.

"Silvia Rose Icing. Born in 7,000,126 World Creation. Died 7,000,148. Daniel Edgar Icing. Born 7,000,116. Died 7,000,131," he recited. "Jackson Overland Frost. Born 1695 Anno Domini, died 1712. Pippa Hazel Frost. Born - well, she never exactly died. Thanks to Silvia, she crossed over the immortal realm before I could take her," he gave up, flicking his wrist lazily, closing his eyes, and reclining back. He opened them to stare at his pet almost blankly. "Remember now?"

Cerberus hunched his shoulders. He had seen many deaths and souls pass on in his time since he and Death were created with the life of this world. Although those who couldn't die or were ripped from his underworld still stayed in his memory, he couldn't possibly remember _all_ the details at once when his master begged him to recall.

"Pity," Death almost sighed in boredom, looking away. "Let's take a stroll down memory lane, then, shall we?"

_Death lounged in his chair in a similar fashion, watching amusedly as the chubby man from the moon walked down his hall in anticipation. After all, one could easily walk through death's door, but it was not so easily to leave, especially if one made the wrong move._

_Cerberus growled at the living intruder, hunching back into an attack position. When his master gave the order - IF his master gave the order, as he had learned over years - he would be ready to lunge and drag the chubby man to the underworld._

_"Tsar Lunar!" Grim M. Reaper greeted with fake enthusiasm, all for his amusement, "What - a - surprise! I did not take you as one to commit suicide, especially in a foreign world, with a foreign death."_

_The silent threat was not unnoticed. The chubby man gulped nervously. Death smiled. This was so much FUN._

_"I'm not - I mean to say, that's not my intention," he stammered._

_"Hm." Death's amusement did not fade in the least bit. "So, what are you here for?" he asked, relaxing back more._

_"I - " he gulped again._

_Cerberus did not like the nervous human. He sought to drag the man into his underworld after having been brought close enough into Death's reach. He was certainly close enough to be cut down by his master's sythe, if his master chose to do so._

_He took a deep breath, visage showing forced resolve. "I want to make a deal with you."_

_Grim M. Reaper threw his fingers outward. "Oh, ho, ho! Let me guess; immortality? I can't give you that, my friend."_

_The chubby man shivered under being called 'my friend'. While not a bad ally (if Death actually had allies), one certainly didn't want to have the grim reaper as his friend._

_"N-no. I already have that. Well, - from my galaxy," he faltered._

_Death's smile nearly vanished. His brow furrowed. "Then what do you want?" he cut to the chase, all the amusement gone from his voice._

_"There are four people I would like to - um," he stammered under Cerberus' master's harsh gaze, "I want four people to become immortals so I can - um - Stop staring at me like that!"_

_Death's smile returned in the form of a snicker. He was amused again, finding the chubby man funny._

_Cerberus pouted inwardly. This man was not likely to die today; or at least for the moment._

_"Four people, eh?"_

_"Yes, that's right. It's for..." and the chubby man explained his situation to the reaper of life._

_Grim M. Reaper sighed, as if this was not as exciting as he expected it to be. Cerberus knew this was all but a farce._

_"I see," Death consented tonelessly. "I get it. BUT - " he smiled mockingly, "ONLY because I think this could bring more despair - which will cause more death - " he laughed, "as it comes to be. Yes, I agree." He leaned in foward. "Do you have anyone in mind, Tsar Lunar?"_

_The chubby man stared suspiciously, as if he was trying to figure out what Death was playing at. Cerberus could have snorted. Good luck with that._

_"No, not particularly - "_

_"Good; then I shall choose for you." His master held out a hand. A light surrounded by greenish tint appeared in his hand. He stared intently into it for a moment before speaking. "Yes, these four will do the trick. Marie A. Wilde, about to die at hands of her insane husband. She loves nothing better than spring. Ashton L. High, about to be wrongfully burned to death as," Death covered his mouth to keep from chuckling, mirth twinkling in his eyes, "an evil wizard. He'll do for summer. Aurora P. Faell, will soon die of disease. Autumn is her favorite season due to the change in leaf colors. And Queen Silvia R. Icing. About to be murdered by terrorists. She's loved winter since she was a child and is about to die very cold hearted."_

_Grim M. Reaper let the orb fade away. "After they are reaped, they are your's. They will not enter Cerberus' underworld."_

_Cerberus gawked at his master, stupified, horrified, and annoyed. His master ignored his gaze, shooing him. Cerberus turned sulkingly to the chubby man and growled. The chubby man stiffened._

_"Th-thank you? Lord Death," he stammered, not sure what else to do. Cerberus could have rolled his eyes, all six of them._

_"Please," Death said in fake, sweet voice, "do not call me that. We are friends, aren't we? D. will suffice."_

_Yes, his master was very amused right now._

_Tsar Lunar stuttered a bit before turning to go. Once he left safely, Cerberus laid down, heads on his paws. He eyed his master carefully, wondering specifically why he chose those people._

_"Oh, don't worry, Cerberus," he re-assured, still watching the hall the chubby man had passed through. "I will get them. I always get them back. Eventually," he added, stretching his limbs and torso. Death yawned. "But there's a lost soul attatched to Silvia Rose Icing. He stayed with her instead of submitting my wrath. I hate souls with unfinished business. Once this Mother Nature woman is done with her toys, the soul wil no doubt follow his sister back to me. Then I will have him."_

_Cerberus whined. All that trouble for one soul._

_His master grinned at him. "Ahh, don't be like that!"_

_Thousands upon thousands of years later, Death returned from one of his hunts. Dropping his bag of harvested souls in front his dog, he didn't even acknowledge the creature as it hastily took the bag away from the hall, ripping it with his many teeth._

_Death was not in the best of moods. He was still sore over having lost two souls to Tsar Lunar more than a millenia ago. Which was why he did not smile when the stubby man walked doen his hall. In a bad mood, Cerberus busy, and having just returned fronm his hunt, he kept his sythe close, in his hand._

_This time, however, the Tsar was more confident than the last. Whether it was because he had already faced Death once and lived, or whatever had happened since, or both, Death didn't quite know, nor did he care. He knew it irked him, though, to see this fool confident. Death did not take theives well._

_"Tsar Lunar," he greeted._

_"Hello, Lord Death," the stubby man returned._

_"Have you come to finally die? I assure you, Cerberus will be most pleased; he's been wanting to take you down to the underworld since you first met," he told the man._

_The foriegner chuckled, though Death could sense his apprehenion; none walked through Death's halls, even more than once, without apprehansion or anticipation. Still, the chuckling annoyed him, even if the emotions sated the blow._

_"No, I'm not ready to die yet," he said. "I need - I need another winter spirit. I've already discussed it with Mother Nature and now I need your approval."_

_Grim M. Reaper tried to remain annoyed, but his sense of amusement was beginning to return. The man actually expected him to comply! After the last time, he would be lucky to leave the hall without at least an attempt from Cerberus._

_"Really? Why?"_

_The Tsar explained it to him. In the meantime, his dog returned from his duties. Upon seeing the man, he took his usual stance, growling. The Tsar took half a step back, further amusing the unaffected reaper._

_"Uh-huh. I see," the reaper said. "Now give me a good reason why I should let you take another soul to use. In other words, what's in it for me?"_

_Tsar Lunar didn't falter. Death could sense Cerberus' disappointment._

_"It's a winter spirit, my Lord. Surely," he explained without the slightest hint of pleasantness, "you know how deadly winter can be, even unintentionally."_

_Grim M. Reaper smirked deviously, "Indeed, I do. So, who will it be?"_

_The three-headed dog perked his ears at its master, confused and baffled at his master giving in so easily. He was ignored._

_Death didn't expect the stubby man to have anyone specifically in mind again. Which was why was surprised - then amused - when he did._

_"A Jackson Overland Frost. He would have died via drowning in a frozen pond earlier today. You would have reaped him by now, yes?"_

_"Jackson," the reaper repeated the name slowly, enjoying the sound of it. "Yes, I remember him. It was either him or that little girl. Yes, I know of him." He turned to look at Cerberus, almost bored yet smiling. "Would he have entered the river Lethe yet?"_

_"River Lethe?" the Tsar was taken aback._

_The reaper turned back to him. "Yes, you wouldn't know too much about my lair, would you? The river Lethe relieves the soul of all memory of life. The soul forgets its human life entirely. Is that a bad thing for you?" he smiled._

_"Oh no," the stubby man assured, making Death frown. "Actually, that's perferrable. I don't want him to remember his human life just yet. He needs to forget."_

_The shiningami rolled his back so he could see his dog, unamused. "Get Jackson for me. If he hasn't touched the river yet, give him a good dunk. Bring him back here, soul in one piece. There will be no heaven or hell for him today."_

_Cerberus complied. After all, the deal was already set. There was no getting out of it now._

_"Silvia!" Lord Death threw up his arms, smiling gaily at his newest guest not two years later. "How good to see you!" He suddenly got bored with the happiness and sat back down in his usual position. "Well?"_

_Cerberus didn't bother to sit up properly at the intruder's presence. She was an immortal, a former soul that should have been his. Why bother with this one? She wasn't worth it. Now the chubby man, he was one Cerberus wanted to drag to the deep bowels of Hades. He did not not the chubby man._

_With the dog content with his thoughts, Death regarded the woman casually. "What brings you here?"_

_"I think you know," she said, skipping formalities._

_Death had to smile at her edge. "Enlighten me."_

_She made a sour expression, taking his smile as being a smart alec. "A few centuries ago, I lost my element. I was banish- "_

_"I know," he interrupted._

_Silvia's mood soured all the more. How funny!_

_"The point," she decided to cut to the chase, "is, that I nothing in this life for me. I haven't for years. I'm sick of this game. I want my family back. My brother, parents, idiot husband, and children. In other words, I want to die now."_

_Cerberus snapped up at those words._

_Death grunted, mirth in his eyes. "Is that so? Well, I'm sorry, very sorry, to say that's not possible right now."_

_Both the woman and dog stared in astonishment at him._

_"What!?" the immortal fumed. "What to you mean 'not possible'? You are death, for goodness' sake! You can kill me, and you will here and now!"_

_"I love your enthusiasm," Grim M. Reaper commented. He meant it. "Sadly, there's nothing I can do. The only way I can take your life is for you to create an offense so ghastly death would have to be your only form of proper punishment. And that, my dear, is a hard thing to accomplish."_

_Cerberus whined loudly._

_"Be quiet, you big baby."_

_Silvia considered this in silence. "How large of an offense? Tell me. I'll do it."_

_Death raised his eyebrows. He had stopped smiling a while ago, visage now blank, curious if anything. "I'm not too sure. Have you tried discussing it with the Man in the Moon?" he asked, amusement taking over._

_"Shut up."_

_He rolled his head around at her comment, amused at her funny phrase._

_"Maybe you could try running away with Cerberus," he suggested. "See if you can enter the underworld."_

_The three-headed dog perked up at that._

_"Please," the Queen scorned. Cerberus laid his heads back down sourly. "I need to be your grasp first. Otherwise, it won't work."_

_"I'm sorry for the inconveniece," Death told her seriously. "I truly am. You have eternity to plot. When you come up with one that works we'll meet again," he finished, mirth in his voice._

_Silvia angerly took her leave, eyes blazing, parka billowing behind her._

_Death threw his head back, laughing wildly._

_Cerberus merely sulked at his loss._

_"And Daniel," the reaper nearly whispered._

_The soul stopped following his sister. He whirled around in fear and amazement. Silvia crossed the threshold, not noticing or hearing._

_"I'll be gladly awaiting your return, too."_

_The lost soul hurried after his sister. Death continued to laugh, not bothering to reap him just yet._

"Now do you remember?"

Cerberus' ears drooped at his master's bluntness. NYes, nw he remembered. He still wasn't done sulking over that.

"Pippa Frost still hasn't come into my grasp. I didn't even offer her," his master continued. "I want my souls back. I'm done with Lunar's games." He folded his hands neatly under his chin. "Today, I get back two of my souls. If Silvia and Daniel do not come to me, I will steal Jackson back, and Pippa, if I can. If not, then, well," he smiled, amused at his own plans, "Silvia will lose her guardian. Daniel will be on my hunt list. My special lost soul."

**...**

**If you don't understand something, just ask! Is anyone else feeling hyper? No, just me? Maybe it's the pop I've been drinking. Or my Death OC and Cerberus excite me so much. That sounds weird! AHH! WHO ARE YOU PEOPLE! ( I really need to calm down xD)**

_**storygirl99210**_**: Thank you! :D I agree, I'm so horrible to her in her early life. Unfortunately, it's necessay for the plot.**

_**E**_**: Um, thank you for the suggestion, but why are you giving them to me?**


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